Elevating our commitment to non-discrimination and human rights
Since its inception, Airbnb has fostered connection and belonging through travel. Discrimination is the opposite of belonging and we are committed to fighting bias and making the Airbnb community open and fair for everyone. In 2016, we announced an important step in our work to address bias and discrimination on our platform by introducing the Airbnb Community Commitment. All Hosts and guests on our platform must agree to the following commitment in order to use the platform:
I agree to treat everyone in the Airbnb community – regardless of their race, religion, national origin, ethnicity, skin color, disability, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, or age – with respect, and without judgment or bias.
Since its introduction in 2016, we have banned from our platform more than 1.5 million users who have declined our Community Commitment.
Airbnb is better off without people who cannot commit to treating others with respect.
We’ve also began to take additional steps to continue to address discrimination on our platform, including:
- Project Lighthouse was announced June 15, 2020 as a way to uncover, measure, and overcome discrimination and to provide us with clear data and understanding of how discrimination presents itself on Airbnb. We’ve partnered with leading civil rights organizations such as Color Of Change to help us drive this project forward and support current and future work to fight bias.
- We changed our product to only show guest profile photos after a booking is confirmed and continue to increase the number of listings available for Instant Book to facilitate more objective bookings.
- Taken measures to enforce our Community Standards by investigating and removing numerous individuals confirmed to have been responsible for the violent criminal activity at the United States Capitol on January 6, or who are otherwise associated with known hate groups
As a global company operating in 220+ countries and regions around the world, we also work with a range of international organizations to ensure we are promoting belonging and fighting bias and discrimination. For example, we are proud to support the UN Standards of Conduct for Business on Tackling Discrimination against LGBTQ People. Our core values and policies reflect our recognition of and respect for human rights as informed by internationally recognized standards such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs). We are constantly working to improve, and we plan to build on this commitment by ensuring our policies and procedures continue to respect and promote human rights. Participating in the community of organizations, companies, and nonprofits that have embedded the principles of the UNGPs in their activities is the natural next step in our years-long work to serve and strengthen communities by advancing human rights through travel made possible by our platform.
We have more work to do, and much to learn. Since the beginning, we have set a high bar for ourselves, and we strive to be a leader when it comes to promoting belonging and acceptance on our platform. We are proud to be working to foster connection and belonging around the world, and to reach for a world where the human rights of all are respected and advanced.
About Us
Airbnb was born in 2007 when two Hosts welcomed three guests to their San Francisco home, and has since grown to 4 million Hosts who have welcomed more than 900 million guest arrivals across over 220 countries and regions. Travel on Airbnb keeps more of the financial benefits of tourism with the people and places that make it happen. Airbnb has generated billions of dollars in earnings for Hosts, 90 percent of whom are individuals listing their own homes, more than half of whom are women, and one in five employed Hosts are either teachers or healthcare workers. In 2019, Airbnb directly supported 300,000 jobs in just 30 destinations, averaging nine jobs for every 1,000 guest arrivals. Travel on Airbnb also has generated more than $3.4 billion in tax revenue for 29,000 jurisdictions around the world. Airbnb has helped advance more than 1,000 regulatory frameworks for short-term rentals, including in 70% of our top 200 geographies (pre-pandemic). In late 2020, to support our continued expansion and diversification, we launched the City Portal to provide governments with an automated one-stop shop that supports data sharing and compliance with local registration rules. We continue to invest in innovations and tools to support our ongoing work with governments around the world to advance travel that best serves communities.