In its effort to expand its short-term rental business to compete with Airbnb, Booking.com has opened itself up to manipulation by scammers.

That’s one of the conclusions from a recent investigation by the UK consumer group, Which?

In a report called What went wrong with Booking.com?, the consumer group concluded that fraudsters take advantage of the platform’s automated tools.

“The fact that listings – both genuine and nefarious – could be written using the same Booking.com algorithms, rather than by owners personally, makes it hard to tell the difference between a genuine listing and a scam,” the investigation found.

The group said it took less than 15 minutes to create a listing that appeared on Booking.com.

“We didn’t need to provide proof of who we were,” the report said. “And, unlike if you put your house on Expedia’s Vrbo – or on Airbnb the last time we tri