This happened when I called in and spoke to a woman back when I first was looking into using them. The woman on the phone (and I found this very intriguing) said that I HAD to give her either my license or my passport, and I balked. I offered multiple different kinds of ID, including my military ID, and she was absolutely immovable.

To both your points (see Aussie friend below) this might just have been that I got a person on the phone who got a bug up her bum, and she decided to die in a ditch about the passport. I have no idea. But that left me with a very negative and lasting impression. As a result I never investigated using it again. At the time, since a hacker had recently emptied my entire business checking account right down to the very last penny, I was a bit nervous about sharing personal information with good reason.

I still think there’s good reason to be wary, and after reading these articles on AirBnB, I think that at least to an extent I’m right. Conti’s research only shows part of what I suspect is far more widespread.