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Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

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Re: Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

#31

Post by hellweaver666 »

ivan_gammel wrote: post #4
snowpid wrote: post #2

Though I am not a legal expert, it is fascinating, that both European companies had this dispute in front of US courts. One hypothesis would be, that Ryan Air lawyers saw higher chances there than in EU courts.

Isn’t Booking an American company now? The company in Amsterdam is a subsidiary of Delaware company with HQ in Connecticut.

Booking.com BV is a Dutch Company which has subsidiaries all over the world but is also itself a subsidiary of Booking Holdings Group which also owns Priceline, Kayak, OpenTable and quite a few more companies.

Re: Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

#32

Post by rsynnott »

pickledoyster wrote: post #11
cactusplant7374 wrote: post #8

Did Ryanair try blocking their IP’s or adding captchas? Or did they sue because the cat and mouse game became too much?

iirc, Ryanair login-walled ticket prices, which means anyone accessing the pricing/booking pages were agreeing to their ToS

Nah, just went to their website; you don't need to be logged in to price tickets.

(It's _possible_ that this is a recent DMA/DSA compliance thing, I suppose.)

Re: Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

#33

Post by benj111 »

codetrotter wrote: post #17
Closi wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure that’s what login-walled means (ie I can access pricing and booking pages without logging in) If you search on google you are also agreeing to their terms, there just isn’t a checkbox.

This case is about more than that: > It says the companies, which use screen-scraping software to find and resell tickets, add additional charges and make it difficult for the airline to contact passengers.

What it's 'about' (according to one side) and the law involved are 2 separate things.

When I buy something from the supermarket, they add charges and make it difficult for the manufacturer to contact me directly, so that isn't illegal. Many things with bad outcomes are legal.

Breaking the terms of service of the site may be illegal, and if you're mis representing yourself to log in, even more so.

But then you're also moving away from what I would term screen scraping.

Re: Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

#34

Post by arghwhat »

skissane wrote: post #24
walthamstow wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I understand it, scraping data read-only is fine (Google Flights, Skyscanner etc) but using automated processes to book tickets on behalf of customers without sending them to the Ryanair site is not fine.

If the ruling (which I haven't read) says automated booking via screen scraping is illegal: wouldn't a workaround be to replace the automated process with a human in a low-cost country?

Sure, but that's what you want, not what booking.com wants. Booking.com wants to charge you for the service, and if they're not part of the transaction they'd have to get money out-of-band, e.g. as a subscription for the price finding service.

Remember that this lawsuit is between two large companies both trying to get your money.

Re: Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

#35

Post by rsynnott »

Closi wrote: post #14
pickledoyster wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

iirc, Ryanair login-walled ticket prices, which means anyone accessing the pricing/booking pages were agreeing to their ToS

I’m not sure that’s what login-walled means (ie I can access pricing and booking pages without logging in) If you search on google you are also agreeing to their terms, there just isn’t a checkbox.

> If you search on google you are also agreeing to their terms, there just isn’t a checkbox.

Depends where you are, really. In Europe, where Ryanair does virtually all their business, courts have generally been reluctant to take the "haha, you clicked on the website, you've magically agreed to the license" thing as being particularly meaningful, and recent regulations have cut down the usefulness of EULAs even further.

That said, Ryanair prices aren't login-walled anyway.

Re: Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

#36

Post by whazor »

skissane wrote: post #24
walthamstow wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I understand it, scraping data read-only is fine (Google Flights, Skyscanner etc) but using automated processes to book tickets on behalf of customers without sending them to the Ryanair site is not fine.

If the ruling (which I haven't read) says automated booking via screen scraping is illegal: wouldn't a workaround be to replace the automated process with a human in a low-cost country?

Or performing screen scraping in a country where it is not illegal.

Re: Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

#37

Post by ta1243 »

rsynnott wrote: post #29
teeheelol wrote: post #20

I'm not sure why because Ryanair looks really good on the scrapers. I bet it drives a lot of business their way. That is of course until you add all the additional charges.

Ryanair's claim was that Booking.com etc was reselling its seats, adding its own charges on top, and providing false passenger details. It's in Ryanair's interest to portray this as basically a screen scraping case (because Ryanair don't like screen scraping in general), but there does seem to be more to it than just that.

Ryanair relies on dark patterns and brainwashing as part of the checkout process to sell you hotels, insurance, car hire, etc. Those feed into their income stream.

If you bypass that process they don't make their profit.

Re: Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

#38

Post by lotsofpulp »

madaxe_again wrote: post #15
figmert wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I could be mistaken, but from what I'm understanding is that Booking.com books the flights for you, by automating the booking process on Ryanair (and subsequently add their own fees), whereas the likes of SkyScanner show you the information, then direct you to the Ryanair website to book through the airline.

Yup, and having needed customer service the one time I booked a flight through booking.com, I can confirm that they absolutely get in the way - a name change on a ticket turned into an almighty rigamarole with charges left right and centre - even though it was booking who had truncated the name - and the airline wouldn’t talk to me directly as I wasn’t the booking party, booking.com was. The airline said the change w…

Which is why I always try to cut out as many middlemen as possible, especially when traveling. Except Costco, because it’s Costco.

Re: Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

#39

Post by baxtr »

figmert wrote: post #6
doix wrote: post #3

Pretty light article, does anyone have any more context? Does this set a strong precedent for all these types of sites? Booking.com wouldn't be the only site reselling airline tickets, in fact I wasn't even aware they did flights. Does Booking.com do something particularly bad compared to something like SkyScanner or Google flights? > "We expect that this ruling will end the internet piracy and overcharging perpetrat…

I could be mistaken, but from what I'm understanding is that Booking.com books the flights for you, by automating the booking process on Ryanair (and subsequently add their own fees), whereas the likes of SkyScanner show you the information, then direct you to the Ryanair website to book through the airline.

Which is actually convenient for booking users. The Ryanair website is a big mess.

Re: Ryanair wins screen scraping case against Booking.com in US court ruling

#40

Post by codedokode »

figmert wrote: post #6
doix wrote: post #3

Pretty light article, does anyone have any more context? Does this set a strong precedent for all these types of sites? Booking.com wouldn't be the only site reselling airline tickets, in fact I wasn't even aware they did flights. Does Booking.com do something particularly bad compared to something like SkyScanner or Google flights? > "We expect that this ruling will end the internet piracy and overcharging perpetrat…

I could be mistaken, but from what I'm understanding is that Booking.com books the flights for you, by automating the booking process on Ryanair (and subsequently add their own fees), whereas the likes of SkyScanner show you the information, then direct you to the Ryanair website to book through the airline.

I wonder how does booking.com pay for the tickets? Do they use a new card for every transaction or do they buy thousands of tickets with the same card? Do they use a corporate card or personal card (which might be against ToS)? If they use a corporate card, isn't it easy for Ryanair to see it and block the transaction?

Also, cannot airline see that requests come from datacenter IPs and not from residential?

It looks like it is super easy to block this on airline side.

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