Phia, the shopping startup co-founded by Phoebe Gates and Sophia Kianni, is facing renewed scrutiny after new reporting by Bloomberg indicates the two founders knew their platform was engaged in cookie stuffing as far back as December 2025 — months before a spokesperson told the publication the company was only made aware of the issue when Bloomberg first reached out.
Cookie stuffing is the practice of claiming affiliate commission credit for purchases the platform did not actually help generate. It is widely prohibited under contracts that affiliate platforms sign with marketplace partners, as it diverts referral revenue from other legitimate affiliate marketers. Retailers affected by Phia’s cookie stuffing include Nike and Nordstrom.
Bloomberg’s latest investigation, published in August 2026, is based on leaked Slack messages and sources familiar with the matter. Those messages show Gates and Kianni discussing cookie stuffing with executives and engineers. The reporting also found that cookie stuffing accounted for a significant portion of Phia’s sales, and that the company saw a notable drop in daily revenue after stopping the practice.
In early July 2026, a Phia spokesperson had characterized the cookie stuffing as a bug. Bloomberg now reports it was a deliberately built feature that could be switched on and off.
In response to the latest allegations, a Phia spokesperson told Bloomberg the company rebuffed some of the publication’s claims but would “learn from this.” Phia did not respond to TechCrunch’s request for comment.
The new report adds to a growing list of problems for the startup, which launched in April 2025 as a Google Flights-style price comparison tool for shoppers. Separate reporting by Puck found that Phia lost nearly half its full-time employees since the start of the year, that several brands were unaware they were listed on the app, and that investors grew uncomfortable with the company’s heavy reliance on affiliate marketing. Phia has also previously faced criticism for secretly collecting sensitive user data and tracking behavior across the web.
Source: TechCrunch