Bill Gates’ daughter intentionally rigged shopping app commissions – Bloomberg

Internal messages show Phoebe Gates knew her startup Phia was using a ‘cookie-stuffing’ scheme to generate profit, according to the outlet Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates’ daughter Phoebe has been accused of knowingly using a “cookie stuffing” scheme at her shopping startup that allowed the company to collect commissions for sales it did not actually generate, according to Bloomberg.Phia, co-founded by Gates and fellow Stanford graduate Sophia Kianni, markets itself as a digital shopping assistant that finds cheaper products and discount codes. Despite Gates trying to distance herself from the “nepo baby” label and present the venture as independent of her billionaire father, it immediately attracted tens of millions of dollars from prominent Silicon Valley and celebrity investors during its first funding round and was actively promoted by Bill Gates.The controversy around the company first erupted last month, when Bloomberg reported that Phia’s browser extension was automatically inserting affiliate tracking “cookies” into online purchases, allowing it to claim commissions even when shoppers had not used its coupons or links.The practice, known as “cookie stuffing,” can constitute...