Ask HN: How to stop Airbnb from deducting US taxes from non-US host?

A friend of mine has been a long-time Airbnb host with no problems. Neither them nor their properties are in US or connected to US in any way. At the start of the year their account got hacked and some money was withdrawn to a US account. While AirBnB has refunded the lost funds, this withdrawal appears to have marked their account as a US account, which has resulted in 30% US withholding tax being deducted on all payouts. Customer services are unable or unwilling to address this, which is putting my friend's livelihood at stake. It looks like this has happened to others in the past, but there is no way to address this.

If anyone from airbnb is reading this or has a contact there who can help, my email is in profile.