App by Gates' Daughter Accused of Shady Tactics

After coming under scrutiny for how it handled users' browsing data, a buzzy shopping app backed by one of Bill Gates' daughters has now been caught quietly claiming undue credit for online sales, according to tests by Bloomberg and rival Capital One Shopping. Phia, co-founded by 23-year-old Phoebe Gates and her Stanford University roommate Sophia Kianni, pitches itself as a digital stylist that hunts down coupon codes and better prices, per Fortune. But researchers say its mobile browser extension was secretly inserting its own affiliate tracking code at the last moment—sometimes overriding other sites' legitimate referrals and potentially snagging commissions for purchases it didn't help drive.

Affiliate networks and retailers call the move "cookie stuffing," and most ban it. Bloomberg's tests across more than 50 major retailers—including Walmart, Nike, and Zara—found Phia opening hidden tabs to set its cookie, even when shoppers arrived via another publisher or a Google ad. Impact.com, a large affiliate network, says it has suspended Phia over policy violations. A rep for the company, which has raised $43.5 million from big-name investors, acknowledged a "misattribution" problem affecting some users, saying it stemmed from a recent code change and that the team "worked overnight" to fix it; Bloomberg's retests suggest the behavior has stopped. The app, downloaded more than a million times in the past year, was previously accused of logging users' web browsing history, including emails and bank statements.