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How Couchsurfing creates a safe platform for travelers worldwide
Technology Category
- Application Infrastructure & Middleware - API Integration & Management
Applicable Functions
- Business Operation
Use Cases
- Fraud Detection
Services
- System Integration
The Challenge
Couchsurfing, a global travel marketplace, was facing challenges with fraudulent content and repeat offenders on their platform. The company operates on a currency of trust, and fake accounts and spammy content were affecting the experience for legitimate users. These issues could involve phishing, malicious comments, or further risk when linked to offline schemes. Couchsurfing had built in-house tools to combat these issues, but they were clunky, led to lots of manual review, and became outdated quickly. They needed a solution that could address a variety of bad content, malicious users, and returning users who were hiding their identity after being banned. Furthermore, there was no way to proactively improve safety for the community by preventing these bad users from creating fraudulent content.
About The Customer
Couchsurfing is a global marketplace, dedicated to connecting travelers around the world. Founded in 2004, Couchsurfing offers a social experience whether users wish to stay with locals, meet up with like-minded folks in their home cities, or host travelers with a place to stay. Couchsurfers can make connections via desktop site and mobile app, and make up a community of over 18 million people in more than 200,000 cities. As a community, Couchsurfing operates on a currency of trust, and it is crucial for them to maintain a safe and secure platform for their users.
The Solution
Couchsurfing adopted Sift, a solution that provided a stellar user experience, best-in-class machine learning technology, and platform infrastructure. Upon adopting Sift, the team’s efficiency greatly improved – they discovered thousands of spammy accounts, all previously hidden. Prior to integration, the team would have to manually go through an ever growing list of bad users daily, including accounts flagged by community reports. With Sift, at least 50-70% of actions are now automated, freeing the team to focus on other work including learning more about the behaviors of their good and bad users in the Sift dashboard. Sift helped Couchsurfing to proactively fight and prevent content abuse, fake accounts, and other forms of fraud on their platform.
Operational Impact
Quantitative Benefit
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