United Airlines updated its website terms on November 11 so that any AI agent that searches, books or buys on united.com or in its app needs United's prior written permission, Search Engine Journal reported. Search engines may still index public pages, and standard browsers and assistive technology used by a person are exempt, but agent features built into browsers are not. The terms also bar using fares, schedules, availability or pricing to "train, fine-tune, ground, evaluate, or otherwise develop" an AI model.
United updated its contract of carriage the same day. Rule 6.J.6 adds using AI agents to make, modify or service a ticket to the prohibited practices, and Rule 5.H lets United cancel agent-made bookings without notice. According to United's FAQ, travel agencies and booking platforms may not use third-party AI agents for United travel, United works with no third-party agents yet, and bookings made before November 11 will not be canceled.
United says sharing logins with outside AI assistants can expose sensitive information and risks unintended purchases or use of MileagePlus miles, and that automated actions may violate FAA and DOT rules. CEO Scott Kirby said, "I don't want to create another middleman," according to The Wall Street Journal. SEJ noted that as of November 14 United's robots.txt named no AI agents, and that United does not say how it detects them.
