My recent experience with ID fraud.
I have a LTR with a resident tenant with multiple health issues that has been there for 5 years.
He rang me on Friday completely hysterical, as he was unable to pay his rent due to his accounts being frozen.
Some one had stolen his identity, opened 4 bank accounts in his name using 100 points of his ID.
$970 thousand dollars of drugs was intercepted at Grafton post office.
He was interviewed by Australian Federal Police .
They showed him his drivers license with a different photo attached, but same name and birth dates and they had other items of ID
They said they knew his ID had been stolen, but they needed to cover all bases.
He can’t leave town, his rent has now been paid.
This man has no idea how his ID was stolen, but he has been warned that this will be following him for a long time.
Let’s say you answer one of these scam ads. The owner tells you that their name is Susie Jones, tells you that they need copies of your ID, and sends you Susie Jones’ passport copy in exchange, to make themselves appear legitimate and open.
Then, the next time they are scamming the next mark, they will call themselves JJD and send the mark the ID copies you sent them.
The purpose of these scams is not primarily identity theft, it’s bilking people out of their money, but the ID copies they ask the responders to send them is used so that they can keep changing identities.
Our local police have been posting pictures of the various types of skimmers on their Facebook page, asking folks to call in if they see anything that looks like them.
And our state weights-and-measures folks, who are responsible for certifying gas pumps for legal sales, are in the alert network for new devices.
I would never use a standalone ATM, but fortunately I can walk or drive up to my bank’s ATM 3 blocks away. When I traveled and used ATMs for foreign cash withdrawals I asked hotel folks or relatives that I was visiting, and only used major banks.
Brian Krebs is a top US security consultant. I check his blog every week or so, and whenever there’s a major computer security incident.
Here’s a list of his posts regarding card skimmers. The posts have photos,
They seem to be everywhere here. We have our card replaced several times a year.
As long as your bank (that gave you your ATM card) is a major bank, it is not hard to get it sorted out. When someone used my atm card to clear out my account, I had all of my money back in 2 days. And we’ve never been held responsible for a charge on skimmed credit either. Chase FedExes a new card each time. So, I know it happens but it’s not a big deal when it does, especially with a credit card. Of course you should report a skimmer if you find one, but, in my opinion, there’s no reason to worry about it.
Excellent response. Informative and guides the guest to either be willing to provide the necessary information or move on to another alternative.
Bummer. But it’s not identity theft.
Great response- I would not change a thing!
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BEST way for a guest to say PLEASE DON’T HOST ME!
The explanation is already on Airbnb’s website and is requested during the initial registration. If you do not provide the required information Airbnb explains that as well. For more information:
airbnb.com-help-article-1237-verifying-your-identity
The fact she was a non-guest makes me wonder why she picked you to advise of her complaint of the Airbnb request. Perhaps she was hoping to scam you into hosting directly without going through ID requirements. Just as you suggested, to clear your place out without a trace.
How do we trust each other with scamming hosts and scamming guests out there?
Definitely agree w/ your house, your business, your rules. If I was an in-home host, I don’t know if I could accept a new profile/unreviewed guest w/o some way to know it’s them & time to check them out. But in all reality, making/getting fake IDs is apparently not that hard for people who run in those circles….
Once someone walked into a bank in a different state with an ID w/ my info and their face and a copy of my credit card and took $5k in cash off the card. I have zero idea how they managed that.
To be honest, I feel like there is little to no protection & have locks on my and my families credit reports. Someone bought 10k worth of iPhones and ran up a 4K bill and then we were turned over to collections all before knowing anything was going on. They did all of this online…no ID required as far as I know. They just needed the name, social (THIS IS THE ONE TO GUARD) and birthday. It was awful.
I would understand having to show my ID before I could enter and have it match my profile pic but I think I’d be nervous to hand a copy over. I don’t have any other reason than (1) past trauma and (2) I don’t know what they could do with it & (3) I wouldn’t trust the host was keeping it somewhere secure & deleting the copy once I was gone.
Here’s to wanting the world to be a better place.
As a home-share host, I have had several guests who had no reviews. But they all sent me fine initial messages, I had no qualms about accepting their bookings, and they were all great guests.
I have never used IB, and I generally exchange several messages with guests before their arrival. You can tell when someone is a normal, good person, I think the vast majority of the time when you establish some rapport with them by conversing.
When you look at how people get scammed, you can almost always see why. In the case of the guests who get scammed by those fake rental ads claiming they’ll use Airbnb for the first month’s rent, anyone who knows how Airbnb works would never fall for it. But those people never bother to look on the real Airbnb site for an explanation of how Airbnb works, how guests make bookings or how you pay. Then they send off a wire transfer to this total stranger for $3000, at which point the scammer disappears. It’s like sending money to the Nigerian prince-it’s just totally naive.
Same with guests who book places that are actually listed on the Airbnb site, only to arrive to find they can’t get in and the host is unreachable. Those folks IB something (usually cheap, with no reviews), never communicate with the host, then post their scam story, but they’ll say things like- “The host didn’t answer my messages and didn’t send check-in instructions, so I just showed up”. Well, if the host not answering your pre-arrival messages or sending you instructions on how to check-in didn’t send up red flags, there’s not much to be done about someone who just shows up anyway, assuming they’ll have a place to stay.
And while I know some hosts have been broadsided by guests booking for 4, saying they’re just having a little get together with their mom and sisters, only to throw a giant house-trashing party, there are usually red flags the host missed, or they just didn’t bother communicating enough, or asking the right questions.
Anyone can get scammed, but in retrospect, more often than not, it could have been avoided.
Plus @casailinglady. Don’t you know by now? A belief system and point of view outweighs common sense, facts, and logic. Shame on you for running your business your way. 
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Some of us ask for IDs, others don’t. For some, it is required by insurance, HOA, town or city. Some of us want it “just in case”. Clearly, Air won’t have our back if we need to take legal action without the guests ID.
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Whatever the reason, no need to justify your position to “some stranger on the 'net”. We agree 100% and you should run your business exactly as you see fit. Your house = your rules. If we ask for info and a guest refuses, they do not stay with us.
very reasonable. I had one like that myself, insisted they register properly with airbnb, surprise surprise their request fizzled out.
Next time I will be even more emphatic: don’t expect us to take less precaution than any hotel.
Well, I don’t have the link to your listing, do I? Had you posted this on the Airbnb CC forum, where I can click on anyone’s listing before commenting, I certainly would have.
Whose listing? Who is your post in answer to? It doesn’t make sense relative to the OP.
Yay! The young master Chesky cheerleader central.
Boak… (Scottish expresión, Google it 
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JF
It may once have been, but it’s sure not anymore. That forum is full of outrage and complaints about Airbnb. The forum moderators start discussions about namby pamby feel-good topics to try to counter that, but they aren’t that well attended.
So you check there often? I have browsed a few times and even got a private message from a moderator trying to entice me to read some threads. It wasn’t…transparent enough for me. The posts (few I read) were very polite, even when fussing. Sometimes I need saucy. Most times, I guess 
Yes, I post there quite a bit. I don’t see much in the way of nicey nicey polite stuff there these days. It’s more restrictive in terms of having moderators who will step in if people get “personal” or dispense “too tough” love, and profanity and swear words get blocked by the algorithms (I once mentioned on a thread that was about putting fresh flowers in the house something about fall bouquets using pussy-willows and it ended up saying bleep-willows 
)
There was some puke-worthy woman at one point who had set herself up as some sort of self-appointed arbiter of proper forum etiquette who was constantly admonishing other posters for not being “nice”, was posting sickly sweet welcome messages to anyone who posted there for the first time, gushing all over them, and at one point she even started a thread suggesting that regular posters be barred from participating to give new posters a “chance” and not scare them away by not sugar coating everything.
She was painfully naive and kept posting things about how if everyone just got together and presented their case for pet fees, review policy fairness, whatever, that she was sure Airbnb would listen and change things.
Every once in awhile she’d disappear for a few days to lick her wounds because she was so “sensitive” and couldn’t handle anyone being not nice about what she had to say. The moderators there had to keep telling her she wasn’t a moderator and to stop acting like one (they did this privately but I know about it because I had a couple chats with the moderators there about her and they told me they had been dealing with her but she was a difficult case).
You should look for Andrew from Berlin’s posts there- he’s hilarious- super intelligent and articulate and a master of sarcasm and scathing commentary. His posts occasionally get censored when he goes too far.
I’m actually surprised at what they let stand there, considering it’s an official Airbnb forum. But the moderators don’t actually work for Airbnb- they work for a British company called Standing on Giants, which contracts out moderating services. They’re sometimes tasked with relaying some Airbnb BS placating explanation if everyone is up in arms about some new Airbnb outrage, but for the most part, they’re an okay bunch.