This thread vaguely reminds me of Southwest Airlines filing suit against Boardfirst LLC. They offered automated checkin at exactly the T-24hr mark for $5 per boarding pass. (Southwest boards 1/3 of pax each in Axx Bxx & Cxx groups with open seating onboard-so there is a huge incentive to checkin before the others on the flight).

The authors used a public facing website in an automated manner, without logging in. It was automated, but the airline was against even a human secretary doing checkins for hire.

​​​​​​Shortly after Southwest got these services to shut down, Southwest copied them and started SELLING this as paid service. Now they upsell their own "early bird checkin", making their shareholders and management a fortune.