Hacked guest's account

[John498]

I just had an enquiry on Sunday morning from California about staying in London beacuse his partner's mum was ill. I pre-approved but got no response so withdrew it a few hours later as there was no response. I got an email from airbnb security about being in contact with a possible scammer and a message from the real account holder as follows.

"Hi...this is the REAL Brian Hare....unfortunately, someone hacked my airbnb account and tried to book with you. I live in California. So I apologize for any problems this may have caused, if any. When I talked with airbnb, they don't even know why people hack other people's accounts since they can't steal any of the info. Anyways, have a good day! Brian

I have now got a short notice enquiry

"I'm visiting with my two sisters due to us having a funeral to attend which is on the 7th. It is very near the property. Sorry for short notice, it's just that most places are far."

Even though he has four reviews he still hasn't booked and is asking questions like "where will we meet etc?"

As this appears to be the second in two days I am wondering is there some sort of concerted attack on Airbnb? Has anyone else experienced this?

[Axel116]

I did contact my bank immdiately and they are looking into it, but the goal of this forum is to make Airbnb hear these complaints and stop ignoring the issue, as it clearly happens regularly and without much response.

[Sarah977]

@Axel116   One of my guests told me she had had her account hacked a couple years ago and a fraudulent booking made. So now she pulls her credit card info off the site unless she is actively booking herself or in the midst of  booking (I gathered you can't pull it until the reviews are submitted for a booking, as she told me she'd leave a review right after leaving and asked me to do the same so she could remove her credit card info). I would suggest that would be a prudent thing to do- just reenter your credit card info when you need to book, then remove it after the stay is over.

How did you contact Airbnb? I recently got an mail from someone I don't know, purporting to be an Airbnb email about a host meet-up. I had no idea how these people got my email address, so I sent a message to Airbnb with a screenshot of the email I received. They got back to me right away, a trust and safety rep, saying that the email was not from them, that they had checked my account and it as secure and that they certainly hadn't given out my email address to anyone.

There's an art to getting on-point responses from Airbnb. First, calling seems to not be the best way- it seems they never call back despite assurances that they will. Don't write your issue in paragraphs- keep it simple in bullet point form. I began the message "TRUST AND SAFETY ISSUE", then laid out what the problem was in simple, separated, one line sentences with the screenshot attached. I heard back from the Trust and Safety rep within the day.

[Axel116]

Thanks this is helpful! Unfortunately I cannot remove my card from payment options as it is a fake host that charged it, so they will not give me a review. But I was able to remove my other methods and I cancelled the card immediately. Hopefully my bank refunds the money since Airbnb is incompetent. I'll try messaging them. When I call they claim they will escalate the issue, but that is probably customer service jargon to make the customer feel good.

[Nicholas336]

I also have just found out that I too had 3 separate charges totalling approx $1400 USD taken out of my account for accommodation from the 26th of May through the 30th of May in three separate places on the same date. Two transactions for $516 and one transaction for $387. In my profile privacy settings I can see that my account was hacked and used in Cambodia. If this isnt suspicious activity, I’m not sure what is. The three bookings were made and within 10 minutes all the bookings were cancelled, which meant the transaction doesn’t fall within the Air BNB full refund policy because the cancellation is within 14 days of the date booked. Scammers have obviously figured out this glitch and are taking advantage of it. 

I have called Air BNB and my bank to report the fraudulent charges. Air BNB have said these incidents are dealt with through their trust and safety team with no timeline on when the case will be solved. Meanwhile I am out of pocket $1400.  It seems like the amount of cases such as mine above and within threads like this are becoming all to common. Extremely dissapointed as I have been very happy with Air BNB a lot, but to randomly wake up with $1400 taken out of account through fraudulent bookings isn’t acceptable.