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Hotels.com, Expedia provider exposed data for millions of guests
A cloud provider left exposed for millions of guests using major hotel reservation services.
Russia starts antitrust investigation into Booking.com
Booking.com has become the latest US tech company to draw the attention of Russia's Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS). On Monday, the agency said it plans to investigate the hotel and hostel reservation website for anticompetitive practices.
Hopper app now predicts hotel prices around the world
Hopper could already tell you the best time to buy tickets for a flight. Now, it can hook you up with the best prices for a hotel stay, as well. After initially only providing prices for hotels in New York City during a beta run, the popular travel app is now applying its powerful prediction engine to hotels around the world. Users will be able to book rooms through the app at the ideal team for more than 270,000 hotels across 230 countries.
Amazon launches Alexa for hotels
Visitors to Marriott hotels will soon be able to use Amazon Alexa to make their stays more enjoyable. "Alexa for Hospitality" lets guests ask Alexa -- via an in-room Amazon Echo -- for help with hotel information, booking guest services, playing music and managing room controls, such as lighting and temperature.
Get your hotel rooms and flights right from Google search
Google Flights is already a great place to search when you're headed out on vacation or business trips. It uses AI to predict possible flight delays, too, and helps you find rate information on hotels and airline tickets based on peak travel times. Now some new updates will help you find and book hotels and flights right in a Google search.
Google adds more tools to help you find travel deals
Here's the thing about vacations: they're fun, but they can also be stressful when you start thinking about how much they'll cost you. Google is trying to take a bit of that stress away by launching a handful of features that can make your trips more affordable. To start with, the tech titan has expanded Flight's ability to save you money. Back in October, the flight search service gained the capability to tell you when prices are expected to increase. Now, it can also tell you when prices are lower than usual and by how much, as well as whether prices won't drop any further for the dates you used in your search query.
Hilton plans to offer a smart hotel room system next year
From a Watson-powered concierge to in-room VR porn, hotels are getting more and more tech-savvy and connected. There's an Amazon Echo in every room when you stay at Wynn's Las Vegas hotel, and more destinations are adding ways to watch your own Netflix and Chromecast when you stay. Now Hilton is ready to roll out a new mobile-centric connected room. The smart room system is currently in beta at one Hilton hotel and set to deploy to several more in the coming weeks. A full deployment to all Hilton hotels is planned for next year.
Hopper app uses predictive pricing tech to find NYC hotels
You always hear about the best time to book your travels for big savings, but do you ever follow up? Hint: You're better off nabbing Thanksgiving flights now. That's according to Hopper, a startup that relies on big data to help you purchase cheap airfares through its app. Now, it's applying its predictive smarts to hotels, starting in NYC.
Airbnb gives business travelers the option to book with Concur
Business travel can seriously suck, with soulless, inexpensive hotel rooms the norm for many of us. Airbnb offers a unique alternative, with personal homes and rental units that business travelers can stay in while on a work trip. To make it even easier to book business trips through the company, Airbnb is expanding its partnership with Concur, a business travel portal that Airbnb first partnered with in 2014.
Dish knows hotel TV sucks and it wants to help
Checking into a hotel can be like moving back in time, at least when it comes to media. We're all used to using our own devices to watch television and movies, stream music and play games, but many hotels still cling to their cable-style in-room TV systems that we basically bypass to use our own entertainment. Satellite internet and television provider Dish wants to change all that with a new system for hotels called Evolve. It's a 4K-capable box powered by Android TV that sits behind your room's monitor that you can stream to as well as watch live TV in HD.
Netflix strikes a deal with Enseo to offer its service in hotels
Tired of relaxing in your hotel room and flipping on the TV only to realize you can't binge watch your favorite shows without Netflix? Netflix knows the true horror of this realization. That's why it's partnered with hospitality company Enseo to provide the Netflix app in more hotels.
Google helps you find deals on flights and hotels
Planning a vacation often revolves around the delicate art of booking flights and hotels at just the right moment to get a great deal, and Google knows it. The internet pioneer is rolling out a slew of updates that, for the most part, are focused on getting you the best possible bargain. To start, you'll see automatic "deal" labels in searches whenever a hotel rate goes below the norm, and tips when tweaking the dates of your stay could save you some cash. You can also filter hotel searches for very exact criteria -- if you want to look for four-star hotels in Chicago that allow pets, you can. The tips and filters are only now rolling out (filters are limited to the US at first), but they'll be available worldwide over the course of the year.
Amazon shutters its 'Destinations' travel site after just six months
Amazon Destinations, the travel site that offered deals on hotel stays, is no more. The company shut down the site yesterday, just six months after it began offering reduced rates on one- to three-night stays within driving distance of a city. Destinations only offered lodging in areas around LA, New York and Seattle when it launched in April, but expanded in July to include Atlanta, Boston, Houston and San Francisco. The company will honor reservations that were already made through the site, but the site's help page says that Amazon is no longer selling hotel stays on the web or through its "Local" app. If you're looking to save some coin on travel, it looks like you'll have to employ the likes of Expedia and Kayak. [Image credit: dierken/Flickr]
Netflix is coming to a Marriott near you
After being scolded by the FCC over its plans to block guests' personal WiFi connections back in January, Marriott hotels has announced that it is partnering with Netflix to deliver the streaming service as an in-room amenity. According to a Marriott press release, guests staying at select hotels will now be able to log in to their existing Netflix accounts directly through their rooms' televisions. The service is currently available in six locations -- New York on the East Side, San Jose, Princeton, Newport, Dallas/Fort Worth and Bethesda -- with a half dozen more locations (including San Francisco, Atlanta and DC) coming online later this summer. Marriott hopes to expand the service to over 100 locations by the end of the year and deliver it to more than 300 locations by the end of 2016.
Using Netflix on your hotel TV sounds pretty painless
Surprise! Netflix built into hotel-room TVs doesn't seem awful. When Mariott announced that it'd add streaming apps including the House of Cards outfit, Crackle, Hulu Plus, and YouTube into its in-room entertainment options, there was reason for concern. Would it require any separate fees? What about account security? As Cord Cutters News reports, you need to use your personal logins for 'flix and Hulu and you can either clear your credentials manually, or the hotel will do it for you automatically at the time of check out. The apps apparently run without a hitch and are the most up to date versions like you'd use on Amazon's Fire TV and the Roku 3. Oh, and the remotes have built-in Netflix buttons like you'd find at home and abroad. Now I'm curious when RIchard Branson will implement something similar into his Virgin Hotels. [Image credit: Manybits/Flickr]
Amazon Destinations handpicks hotels in LA, NY and Seattle
Amazon's rumored new travel site has appeared and it's well, exactly as rumored. While the company previously sold flash-sale hotel rooms as part of Amazon Local, alongside steep discounts, Destinations is more about curated hotels. The service currently focuses on areas around LA, New York and Seattle, with the aim of selling short-term getaways that are near to those aforementioned transport hubs. There's no news on whether it'd roll-out the new service to other US areas (let alone other countries), but it wouldn't be a shocker if it did. The site is already accepting user reviews, but expanding the service will likely depend on how many people are looking to pay typical list prices - if only because it's paired with the ubiquity of Amazon.
A night in Richard Branson's state-of-the-art Virgin Hotel
Richard Branson knows how to make a first impression. The first thing I saw when I arrived at Virgin's debut hotel was a statuesque blonde in a bright-red trench coat stepping out of a matching-hued Tesla, with a photographer documenting the whole ordeal. The photographer was there for glamour shots, naturally, and the Model S serves as the hotel's house car that'll drop guests off anywhere within a 2-mile radius. However, it wasn't in service just yet. Virgin bills the hotel as "brilliant," and to see just how smart it actually was, I spent a night in the premiere Chicago location. Given that the inn is run by the same company that wants to make us all space tourists with Virgin Galactic, I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised by anything during my stay -- least of all, an electric sports sedan waiting out front.
High-tech Japanese hotel to employ human-like robot staff
Going to Japan? Here's a bit of advice: if you're absolutely terrified of eerie human-like robots, think very hard before visiting Nagasaki prefecture's Henn-na Hotel that's slated to open its doors in July. Why? Because the high-tech hotel will employ 10 robots, three of which are multilingual gynoids that look like they were shipped straight from Uncanny Valley. Kokoro, the robots' manufacturer, calls them "actroids," and yes, you've seen us feature them in the past. Thankfully, they're stuck behind the check-in counter as receptionists, so you can just get that part done as fast as possible. Or, you can try to flirt for a room upgrade if that's your thing, since they can apparently establish eye contact and respond to body language.
Stayful is a must-have money saver for travelers
Stayful is a travel app that finds hotels in a number of cities across North America based on exactly what you're looking for, then gets you the best price possible. Browse photos of the hotels, view a list of amenities and reasons why you might like your stay there, then quickly make a reservation right within the app. Customize your price range, type of hotel or stay, location and time frame all in a few taps to focus in on what you're looking for. Stayful is free for iPhone and requires iOS 8.0 or later. Good design means looking and functioning beautifully. Fortunately, Stayful achieves both. The app design is among some of the better ones I've seen since the launch of iOS 8. Interestingly, many of the animations remind me of Android's new Material design language. It's quite charming though to say the least. What's more important than some subtle animations is how the app works, and Stayful so nonchalantly throws away all the unnecessary complexities that often come with booking hotels. The app asks you a simple question: "What are your travel plans?" Then you fill in the blanks. Choose from one of the supported locations: Anaheim, Boston, Charleston, Chicago, Dallas, Fort Lauderdale, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York City, Orlando, Palm Springs, Phoenix, Portland, San Antonio, San Diego, San Francisco, Santa Fe, Savannah, Seattle, Telluride, Toronto, Vancouver or Washington, D.C. Next, pick your ideal hotel. Are you looking for a luxurious vacation spot? Do you prefer a low-key stay that's particularly kid-friendly? Perhaps opt for a delightful bed and breakfast. Either way, the customization options are here and abundant. While you're at it, choose between a budget, mid-priced or premium stay. After you just put in which days you want to stay, Stayful finds all independent and boutique hotels that meet your criteria and serves up the best price possible for each. I tested this out and the claim seems to ring true; multiple competitors I tried couldn't match Stayful's prices. Note that you may not always get hotels matching what you're searching for. Stayful only searches through independent hotels, so don't expect any Hampton Inns or anything of the sort to show up in your search results. This somewhat limits the diversity of the options, but at the same time it's arguably unreasonable searching for a "luxurious" hotel with a "budget" price. When you do get results, the app displays gorgeous photos for each hotel plus the price per night. Tapping a hotel brings up further information like ratings on TripAdvisor, amenities, a map and cleverly organized bullet points with some benefits about staying there, jargon-free. If you do decide to book with Stayful, bear in mind that the price initially listed does not include tax recovery charges and service fees. Still, those included, it's difficult to beat what Stayful offers. From start to finish, finding the perfect hotel with Stayful is an easy, elegant process that makes you want to abandon any other travel service. Though it doesn't support chain hotels, it's superb for anyone looking to support local businesses or stay somewhere that's uniquely admirable on its own. Stayful could largely benefit from an iPad version of its app, which it currently lacks. Do yourself a favor and at least download Stayful free for iPhone in the App Store.
Amazon rumored to be preparing travel site that offers hotel bookings
Are you ready to spend even more money at Amazon? According to Skift, Amazon is preparing its own travel service, focused on independent hotels and resorts near major US cities, including New York, Los Angeles and Seattle. The travel news site discovered that two independent hotels have already signed up to the service and one that was strongly considering doing so. Amazon would reportedly house a curated range of hotels within a few hours' drive from those aforementioned cities.
