Man allegedly burgles home after cancelling Airbnb reservation

[DoubleGlazing]

In a somewhat similar vein, a few years back my wife got in to the whole Couchsurfing thing - which could be said to be a forerunner of AirBnB.

A nice couple from the other side of the world stayed with us for the weekend. When they left I noticed they had taken six Intermec Windows CE warehouse scanners with them. I'd been working from home for a bit so that why I had them, I was updating the software to work with our new ERP system.

They were backpacking so I'm not too sure what they planned to do with them. These devices are hard to hide and they didn't take the charging cradles.

I had to pay to replace them out of my own pocket as our home insurance wouldn't cover work owned items.

[cloudjacker]

Was it too late to chase them down?

[JDiculous]

Though this is only tangentially related - door locks with digital codes really need to be the standard. I live in NYC and have never seen this here. Meanwhile, in South Korea digital code locks seem to be the standard.

Copying a key takes 2 seconds and costs less than a dollar. Giving your keys to someone is a huge security risk.

[ghaff]

Many of us don't routinely give out keys to people we don't have some sort of ongoing relationship with (whether personal or professional) so "really need to be the standard" seems rather strong. That said, if I were renting out a property or otherwise had a lot of different people who needed access, I would definitely install door locks with digital codes. (I actually have a keypad for my garage door but it would be a nuisance to reset.)

[pavanred]

I recently stayed at an AirBnB. The host used a keybox that was next to the main entrance of the property which had the key to the house and shared a code with me, so that when I get to the property I can use the code to get the key. The problem I saw with this is that the code was extremely weak. And I suspect, based on the the nature of the code, that the host perhaps doesn't change the code for each guest. I hope they do. Just using a digital lock wont help if people use weak passcodes etc. and use bad security practices.

[Waterluvian]

I mostly agree with you. But let's be fair about the process for getting a key copied:

1. Wander around the store finding someone who looks like they know how to copy a key

2. Follow them awkwardly while they finish helping someone else

3. Watch them wander through all the key templates to find the right one.

4. 20 seconds into the first attempt he notices a deformity and starts over.

5. 11 seconds into the second attempt, the key catches and goes soaring majestically across the store.

6. 53 seconds into the third attempt you finally have your key.

7. Discover you forgot your wallet.

Still a bigger security risk than having digital lock doors.

[joe_momma]

Technology is always cool until the idiots and criminals figure out how to use it...

[noahmbarr]

AirBnB must hate this type of news. It undermines the trust that is essential to bring "sellers" to their marketplace.

[et-al]

Not necessarily. From my personal experience more Airbnb hosts are renting out places that aren't their primary residences, so there's nothing of value in the apartment (as mentioned in the article).

[ohitsdom]

That's a surprisingly helpful blog post from the police department. Very practical tips that will keep you safe from 98% of this kind of trouble.

[danny_taco]

I'm surprised the police followed through with the information from the victim. I went through the same after being burglarized and I couldn't do anything because the detectives didn't care and/or were unreachable. This was in Houston though.

[Jabbles]

I wonder if thieves build up reputation on AirBnB before burgling. I know this is reasonably easy to automate on eBay (buy many lowcost items), but it seems AirBnB's reputation system would be harder to game.

[ctvo]

I had a new AirBnB account (0 reviews) and booked 3 places in advance and had 0 issues. Hosts are just glad to take someone's money most of the time, and aren't very picky.

I don't think they'll need to game the system with fake reviews for a long time.

[legulere]

I guess AirBnB will go the way of ebay: First thought to be for normal people to make their excess stuff to money, now a platform for big sellers.

[patcheudor]

"If you must leave these items at home, lock them in a safe that is secured to the floor of your home. Please remember that whatever is left at your home may be stolen, even if it is in a safe or hidden in a place you think nobody will ever find."

This is odd advice. Essentially: "lock your stuff up in a safe but that's likely not sufficient."

In fact, it's absolutely not sufficient because safes are rated based on how long it takes to get into them. If the thief is renting out a place which has the safe they'll get into it, especially since most people following the advice to lock their stuff up in a safe are likely not going to purchase anything stronger than a consumer grade safe, all of which tend to be fairly trivial to break into either covertly or through brute force given sufficient time.

The better advice would be to not leave anything of value, period. A safe isn't going to save your stuff.

[fredley]

* burgles.

I tend to ignore these types of news articles, of the format: "[Pokemon Go/AirBnB/Uber/New Thing] used in crime!". Crime remains the same, the landscape and tools change. Crime rates have been dropping for decades, and continue to fall, new technologies are not bringing in a new crimewave, although you wouldn't know it from reading some news sources.

[ciaranm]

Did you read the article? It's a police blog - and has a list of things to consider doing when letting a place on AirBnB et al. Doesn't at all appear to be what you think it is. Certainly not just a 'new article'.

[Someone1234]

Burglarize and burgles are synonyms, the correction is unneeded.