A Delaware District Court jury ruled in favour of Ryanair, which accused Booking.com of violating the US Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.
Ryanair Holdings welcomed the verdict of the jury which found Booking.com had done so knowingly with ‘intent to defraud.’
Ryanair had suffered economic harm by Booking.com’s screen scraping activity.
The Delaware Court jury also dismissed Booking.com’s counterclaims against Ryanair for defamation, unfair competition, and deceptive trade practices.
The airline claims Booking.com used intermediate software providers to scrape Ryanair’s website.
Ryanair’s CEO Michael O’Leary said: “We expect that this ruling will end the internet piracy and overcharging perpetrated on both airlines and other travel companies.”
“It is unacceptable that global giants like Booking.com have been engaged in these illegal and deceptive practices for many years.”
“We also welcome the Delaware Courts rejection of Booking.com’s counterclaims that they had been defamed by Ryanair when calling them an OTA Pirate.”
