The Fight to Regulate Airbnb

Legislators across the country are trying to regulate companies like Airbnb, but a law passed 20 years ago is making it tough. So lawmakers in places like New York are turning their attention to Airbnb users — looking to penalize people who list their homes on the site.

One of the reasons users can be slapped with fines while Airbnb avoids penalties is a clause in the Communications Decency Act — a set of federal laws passed in 1996 — that says internet companies like Airbnb cannot be held responsible for whatever users post on their sites.

This week on Money Talking, Tony Romm, senior technology reporter for Politico, and Olivier Sylvain, a law professor at Fordham University, discuss how a law passed before Airbnb existed shaped internet companies' ability to do business, and why it's making some lawmakers very frustrated.