The rise of home rental services such as Airbnb has been swift in changing the way we holiday – but there’s a potential dark side too.
Several stories about holidaymakers finding hidden cameras in rental properties have raised questions about the safety of staying in a stranger’s home in recent years.
In November, Ian Timbrell, 41, found a camera tucked between two sofa cushions in the flat where he had booked a room via Airbnb.
Sharing the experience on Twitter/X, he posted a photo of himself pointing at the camera, alongside the caption: “OK, normal or weird? My Airbnb has a webcam watching the whole living room. Am I wrong to have unplugged it? Seems like a huge invasion of privacy to me!”
In October 2023, a newlywed couple from China honeymooning in Malaysia said their experience was disrupted after they allegedly discovered a hidden camera in their Airbnb homestay. The couple claimed the camera was hidden and pointed towards their bed.
Writing on Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu under the name “Zhenmei Beauty,” the couple said the alleged camera was installed inside a wall power socket at the house in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah.
The detection of the apparent device prompted a police investigation, according to news outlet South China Morning Post, and has led to travel warnings as well as tips from experts on how to avoid being spied on while on holiday.
It follows a similar incident in July 2023, when a couple filed a $75,000 lawsuit against an Airbnb owner after they allegedly found hidden cameras recording them during their stay.
Texas couple Kayelee Gates and her fiancé Christian Capraro stayed in property owner Christoper Goisse’s vacation rental in Silver Springs, Maryland, in August 2022. The two were engaging in intimate activity in the bathroom before they allegedly located disguised cameras recording them. They had moved into the main room, “laid down on the bed, put a movie on and began to relax,” per the filing report. When Gates and Capraro’s looked up at the ceiling, the pair noticed there were two smoke detectors in the room: one directly above the bed and one in the corner.
As they moved closer to inspect the devices, they noticed what appeared to be cameras hidden in plain sight and were convinced they found another in the bathroom. They took one device in the bedroom down, at which point they…
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