I had a similar experience recently. After the booking was confirmed the host sent us a website to fill out and asked for our credit card number for a deposit.

I had a similar experience recently. After the booking was confirmed the host sent us a website to fill out and asked for our credit card number for a deposit. This sent off a lot of red flags as AirBnB specifically says not to compile with this. Calling AirBnB was useless. They confirmed that we should not pay the deposit, but it was up the the host to cancel our booking since it was less than 24hours away. AirBnB says as long as the booking is active then we have a right to be there. I share AirBnB's response with the host and they said they would call the cops if we showed up. Two more calls to AirBnB, including one the morning of the booking and they still needed the host to cancel the booking. And since I "requested" the cancellation the host wasn't charged for cancelling my booking the same day. After using AirBnB off and on for several years, this left a very sour taste.