Phia, a shopping app developed by Phoebe Gates and Sophia Kianni, has been blocked from using Impact.com, a major platform that connects shopping apps with retailers. The block came after Bloomberg discovered Phia was engaging in "cookie stuffing" — essentially, taking credit for sales it had no role in making TechCrunch.

Here's how it worked: Phia's browser extension (a small piece of software that sits inside your web browser) would silently open a hidden tab in the background while you checked out on a retailer's website. That hidden tab would place Phia's own tracking marker — called a "cookie" — into your transaction, even though Phia had nothing to do with you deciding to buy. This marker is what determines who gets paid when a sale happens. By inserting it at the last moment, Phia claimed money it hadn't earned Bloomberg. Independent researchers and Phia's competitors confirmed the same pattern was happening repeatedly.

Phia told Bloomberg the problem has been fixed, and Bloomberg checked and confirmed the hidden-tab behavior has stopped. TechCrunch asked Phia for a statement and did not receive one.

Phia started in 2025 when Gates was 23. The company has raised $43.5 million from investors, more than the roughly $35 million it reported raising in January 2026 TechCrunch. Celebrity investors including Kim Kardashian and Hailey Bieber have backed the company, which has given it significant media attention despite being relatively small.

Phia's main product is a browser extension that finds the cheapest price for items across different stores and shows you discount codes at checkout. Like other apps in this category, Phia makes money through commissions: when someone buys something after using Phia's tool, Phia gets paid a small cut. The commission structure is what made the deception financially worthwhile. The same issue has led to a lawsuit against Honey, a similar shopping app owned by PayPal.

This kind of fraud is not new. Shopping browser extensions operate at a vulnerable point in the system: they sit in your browser at the exact moment you're about to buy something. The affiliate payment system typically rewards whoever's tracking marker is present at that final moment, regardless of whether they actually helped you find the product. It's a design flaw that has existed for over a decade, and a background tab firing at checkout can easily claim credit without ever having directed you to the store. Platforms like Impact.com exist partly to catch this behavior, and blocking a company is the standard response once the fraud is confirmed.

This is not Phia's first data problem. In November 2025, Fortune reported that the app was collecting more personal information from users than seemed necessary for its stated job of tracking shopping preferences Fortune. Combined with the cookie-stuffing findings, a pattern emerges: Phia's actual practices have not always matched what it told users and retail partners it was doing.

Shopping apps like Phia face a genuine tension. They need to see and interact with your checkout to find savings and discount codes. That access is their entire purpose. But the same position in your browser that makes them useful also makes fraud easier. The lawsuit against Honey has shown this is not just one company's problem — it is a widespread risk in how these tools work.

For retailers and other payment services that had their commissions stolen, the loss was real money. Neither Bloomberg nor TechCrunch has said how much was taken in total. For Phia, the immediate impact is losing access to Impact.com's network, which cuts off a way to reach customers and get paid. Whether Phia gets access back depends on whether Impact.com audits and confirms Phia's promised fix is genuine.