Not nice at all, I certainly wouldn’t want Facebook and Google knowing about which flights I take.
Apple Wallet and the various .pkpass-apps in F-Droid should be more than enough to satisfy the technical requirements for a boarding pass.
You may want to add this incident to the Consumer Rights Wiki which tracks anti-consumer practices by companies, such as privacy violations, dark patterns and anti-ownership practices.
The more companies try to persuade / force me to install their apps, the more strongly I feel about refusing to do it. I think it is worth having a second cheap phone for installing an app on a temporary basis, if there is simply no other option. That phone would have no other apps, personal information or data on it at all, apart from what is generated by that particular app. Then, I would reset the phone once the app has served it’s purpose, turn it off and put it back in a drawer, ready for the next time this is needed. It is by no means an ideal solution but, it is one that I am considering for the future when a situation arises where I can’t just say “no” anymore. In the meantime, I simply avoid any commercial services that require apps to be installed but, it is getting harder.
A VM with Android or Waydroid might also be an option, then you can more easily reset it. But that’s not practical at an airport, and especially not for average people.
I think requiring the app isn’t even really the worst part, the tracking here is. However, a website can leak data to Facebook, Google and others too, and if it happens on the server side, blocking it with an ad blocker won’t work.
Ultimately, I fear the only way to avoid this long term would be legislation against tracking, personalized advertising, data brokering, technically not warranted app requirements and app-only discounts, and that is unlikely to happen.
I’m boycotting unnecessary and untrustworthy apps too, at least as much as I can, but it’s getting more and more difficult.
If you have already checked-in online and your smartphone or tablet is lost,
you will receive a free of charge boarding pass at the airport.
What happens if my smartphone or tablet dies before airport security?
If you have already checked-in online and your smartphone or tablet dies,
you will receive a free of charge boarding pass at the airport.
I wonder if you check in via the website and just go to the desk and say you’ve lost your phone or it’s out of battery, they’ll just print it out for you. I used to just the show the printable PDF on my phone.
They probably will print your boarding pass for you, in this case. They wouldn’t expect people to do this, if they have a smartphone because most people prioritise convenience over privacy. I used to do what you did (copy the pdf version to my phone) and take a paper copy printed at home, as well, in case my phone died or lost signal.
