European budget airline Ryanair has won a lawsuit in a U.S. court against Booking.com over allegations that the popular travel booking site and its subsidiaries illegally ‘screenscraped’ the Ryanair website for flight prices.
Up until very recently, Dublin-based Ryanair refused to market its flights through online travel agencies and price aggregator sites, effectively forcing passengers to book direct through the official Ryanair website.
The airline railed against online travel agents who attempted to get around this block by using technology to ‘scrape’ ticket prices from the Ryanair website and then present them to customers as if they were authorized to do so.
Ryanair accused these online travel agents on then adding a mark up and including additional fees which made it more expensive that buying direct.
In 2020, Ryanair filed a lawsuit against US-based Booking.com in a Delaware Court, accusing the company of violating Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.
On Thursday, a jury unanimously ruled in Ryanair’s favor, and also found that Booking.com had screenscraped Ryanair’s website with the intention of defrauding the airline.
In a further blow to Booking.com, the jury also dismissed a counter claim that the company had brought against Ryanair in a bid to claim that the airline had defamed it and was causing unfair competition, and deceptive trade practices.
“It is unacceptable that global giants, like Booking.com (mkt cap $133 billion), have been engaged in these illegal and deceptive practices for many years with the intent to defraud both Ryanair and consumers,” slammed Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary on Friday.
“We hope these Delaware Court rulings will now see an end to OTA [online travel agents] Pirates illegally screenscraping travel websites like Ryanair.com, and will force consumer agencies across the UK and Europe to finally take action to outlaw this illegal screenscraping and over charging of consumers for flights and ancillary services,” O’Leary added.
Booking.com was originally founded in Amsterdam but is now listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange and is headquartered in Norwalk, Connecticut.
The company also owns Priceline.com, Agoda.com, Kayak.com which were all accused of illegally screenscraping the Ryanair website.
In recent months, Ryanair has softened its stance towards online travel agents, signing deals with some of the biggest players in the market which gives them official access to Ryanair ticket prices.
In return, Ryanair says these companies have promised not to overcharge consumers while, presumably, also agreeing a commission for Ryanair.
On the same day as the Delaware court ruling, Ryanair announced it had signed its latest deal with the Expedia Group, adding to deal with the likes of Lastminute.com and Onthebeach.com.
