My Airbnb account was hacked two nights ago, and the PayPal account set up for payments was drained. I followed security instructions to change my password, etc. I was asked to verify recent activity from my devices: the system (Microsoft), the state (Mississippi) and the day (0 days, 4 days, etc). Later, as I looked at the security link again – anything that might help me reach them – new activity showed up from China and Montreal.
I tried to cancel the scam reservations only to receive an email that they wouldn’t refund the money because of the host’s refund policy. Really? I found myself in a loop of help commands that got nowhere, and certainly had no way to contact them to let them know that I did not make the reservation and my account had been used fraudulently. This morning, I received an email from Trust & Safety that I may have received a “malicious message” from another Airbnb member whose account was cancelled but the links in it were, again, a maze.
“At Airbnb, we do everything we can to create a safe and trusted marketplace. Rarely, fraudulent individuals misuse our site in the attempt to obtain offsite payment or to gain access to one’s account by communicating via personal email or phone, or by sending malicious links meant to capture your login credentials, and we wanted to alert you to the possibility of such a scam.”
I had responded to no links. They were not attempting to get “offsite payment.” They hacked my account. They took my money via Airbnb’s unsecured website. Today, my Airbnb account was cancelled, leaving me no way to contact them via phone without a “verified phone number” nor links that all require you to “log in.” Even the link “contact us anytime to reopen a canceled account” makes you log in. I’ve reached out to PayPal for help. Has this happened to anyone else? Is this a large-scale breach that’s not being made public?
I got hit by a similar fraud, there was a new reservation for $600 on my account starting on the same day it was booked. To make things worse, my account paid $1100 in two separate payments to restore ‘damage or stolen items’.
What’s funny is that I called Airbnb 3 times and was not able to speak to the fraud protection team, which is supposed to deal with my case within 72 hours. The representatives on the phone could do nothing but taking notes for the fraud team, and asking me NOT TO CHANGE THE PASSWORD, so that their brilliant colleagues could look for the criminals.
I tried to delete my Paypal account from Airbnb, but it was not allowed as it is ‘associated with a reservation’. Of course it is! That’s how they kept taking my money!
After reading your story, I decided to:
1. Change the password so that no one can delete my account;
2. Contact Paypal and my bank to get the money back.
I totally lost faith to Airbnb after this incident, as I didn’t see any attempt to fix this issue.
I have just had the same thing happen to me.
Late last night I had a notification from PayPal saying I had £450 charged for AirBNB. I looked at my emails and had three emails at 11:14pm: one confirming a reservation I had never made, two my receipt from PayPal and the third from AirBNB confirming the reservation had been cancelled and due to the hosts policy I wasn’t eligible for a refund. It says to use the resolution centre for extenuating circumstances**
In the next 2-3 minutes I then also had a billing receipt email from AirBNB, an email aking for payment verification details, and then finally an email saying my account had been cancelled (which implies it wasn’t cancelled by AirBNB, but rather, had been cancelled by the ‘user’).
At this point, any attempts to log into my account failed (as it was cancelled) which means I had no way to access my account details, or to access the resolution centre previously mentioned, and no way to contact customer service since every page seems to just link to a “log in for help” button.
I then managed to Google and find a contact number for AirBNB and called customer service. No answer, I was on hold for 30 minutes.
I then sent a Twitter message to the AirBNB help channel advising them of the problem. They didn’t reply until 4 hours later, and even then, only to ask for my email address. It’s now 12 hours since I messaged them and all I am getting is just messages asking for my account information or reservation information – no real action and certainly not fast enough given the amount of money involved.
I spoke to my bank who said that I need to go via PayPal first, and if they don’t refund the money then I could come back to the bank who would then try to help.
I raised a dispute via PayPal last night, and this morning called their Limitations team to ask for more information and for a fast resolution as it was a lot of money. The customer service agent there was helpful and was able to confirm during the call that the case was closed in my favour and they have now refunded the full amount back to my account.
AirBNB were able to charge my PayPal account because they were set up as a subscription on PayPal for automatic payments – something I was not aware of. I have since cancelled ALL my subscription links on PayPal to avoid this happening again.
Given the person’s post above this is obviously NOT a one off instance. Someone is accessing accounts without permission – both guest and hosts – in order to steal money. Something needs to be done about this is as it is fraud.
Please do not make such stupid claims.
Airbnb has never been hacked.
Your Airbnb Account was not hacked.
It was compromised. Either via Phishing and/or via the linked email account being hacked.
Your first move should have been to report your compromised account to Airbnb.
NOT TO TRY TO CANCEL BOOKINGS.
The next thing to do was to report the fraudulent activity/charges to PayPal and your Bank and/or Credit Card Issuer.
You do not need a verified phone number in order to contact or call AirBNB Support.
You can use Twitter and you can also call Airbnb and simply press the # key several times when prompted to enter your phone number.