The new war has started and most people are oblivious. The war is for your data and control of it. The big news recently was that United was banning AI Bots. They’re not the first, Chase Bank, also announced they would ban AI bots. These firms site “security” or “privacy” or some other nonsense but the truth is that it’s about control of you and your data. Here is the excuse United gave according to the article:
The airline said Wednesday that it will prevent personal artificial-intelligence assistants from accessing its systems to book tickets.
United cited concerns that the third-party agents could expose customers’ sensitive information or make unintended purchases.
This is the first time in the history of the world that a business (United) is concerned about unintended purchases and then the concern about exposing customers sensitive information when these firms have been selling data to data brokers for years. What a joke.
The real reason is likely that United has thousands of partnerships with travel agents and agencies and AI will make them obsolete if AI is doing all the booking. Those travel agencies will stop dealing with United if AI is getting all the action.
I’ve been writing about the upcoming changes to the Internet and business models for some time now here and here and I expect things to intensify here with legislation ultimately deciding whether people’s AI agents have a “right” to access systems and data.
Goodbye United
I once had United branded airline cards, even the high end ones, but I got rid of them a while ago and I rarely fly United now so it’s not that big of a deal but if my AI bots can’t book things for me, I will take my business to airlines where I can book with AI agents.
When the Internet started to grow in the early 90s and beyond, there were many Luddites that thought the Internet was a fad and that businesses didn’t need to change their business model. The same thing happened with the transition from buying music on CDs to streaming services. I recall Taylor Swift being strongly against streaming until she finally succumb to the obvious.
The same thing will happen here, these banks and airlines just advertised they are dinosaurs and they are too lazy or too stupid to make changes so it’s time to switch to someone else.
Share The Wealth
Do you think United and Chase are dinosaurs or protectors of their customers?