Phia, the AI-powered shopping startup founded by Bill Gates daughter Phoebe Gates and her Stanford roommate Sophia Kianni said that it is reviewing every transaction carefully and will reverse sales that were incorrectly attributed to it, says a report by People. The development comes days after a Bloomberg report said that the two founders were aware of ‘cookie stuffing’ – a practice where affiliate tracking cookies are placed on a user’s browser without their knowledge, allowing a company to claim commission on purchases even when it did not influence the sale. The report cites internal Slack messages, people familiar with the matter and historical source code saying that both Gates and Kianni were aware of automatic cookie-setting features months earlier.
What Phia spokesperson said
The People report quotes a Phia spokesperson who told the publication:“Any features causing misattributions were immediately removed over a month ago on July 7. We are reviewing every transaction, we are fully committed to and have already begun issuing all transaction reversals to brand partners as a result of any misattribution, and we are hiring a head of compliance to make sure something like this never happens again.”“We are now continuing to connect our users with items and offers from thousands of brand partners,” the spokesperson continued, further adding “We will learn from this and want to ensure our users have the best possible shopping experience, with features like our new digital closet and more to come.”The statement did not address Bloomberg’s latest accusations
What is cookie stuffing that Phoebe Gates’ Phia is accused of
Phia operates as a browser extension designed to help shoppers automatically find discount codes and compare prices at online checkout counters. In exchange, partner retailers pay the platform an affiliate commission when its software helps convert a sale.However, internal chats accessed by the publication reveal that Phia implemented automated features that injected its tracking cookies into a shopper’s checkout session without requiring any user interaction, such as clicking a deal link or applying a coupon code, the Bloomberg report said. By dropping tracking identifiers automatically, Phia claimed credit and commissions for transactions it did not drive, a practice widely known as cookie stuffing and that is strictly prohibited by commercial network contracts and partner agreements.
