Airbnb's anti-party tech cracked down on 4,200 Texas guests last New Year's Eve

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Airbnb is continuing its work to crack down on "unauthorized and disruptive parties" this New Year's Eve after prohibiting nearly 74,000 people from booking last year, the property rentals company shared in a December release.

Airbnb announced it's rolling out new methods of anti-party technology to minimize higher-risk bookings. Those measures include a review of several possible signals, including the length of a guest's stay, the type of listing, how far the listing is compared to the guest's location and when the reservation is being made.

"If a booking is identified as higher risk, the guest will either be blocked from booking, or redirected to alternative accommodations on the platform," the release noted.

Airbnb will deploy these anti-party resources in the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico, the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Australia and New Zealand with the following guidelines enacted:

• Restrictions on one-to-three-night reservations, which will block higher-risk bookings for entire home reservations
• Mandatory anti-party attestation from guests to "confirm that they understand that disruptive and unauthorized parties are not allowed on Airbnb," with possible punishments including suspensions or removals from the Airbnb platform

The rental company has been employing these restrictive measures on New Year's Eve since 2020, with almost 74,000 blocked last year alone. From that 2023 figure, around 33,000 of those people were in the U.S., roughly 5,700 people were in Canada and approximately 16,000 people were in France.

When breaking down U.S. figures from last year's anti-party restrictions, Airbnb blocked or redirected approximately 4,200 guests in Texas, per the release.

More details on how hosts can prevent parties and access a 24-hour safety line are available on Airbnb's website.