Jan. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Priceline.com Inc., Travelocity.com Inc. and Cingular Wireless LLC agreed to pay a total of $100,000 to end a probe by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo of secretly installed ``adware'' to promote products and services.

The settlements mark the first time law enforcement officials have held advertisers responsible for ads displayed through adware placed by others, Cuomo's office said in a statement issued today in New York.

``Advertisers will now be held responsible when their ads end up on consumers' computers without full notice and content,'' Cuomo said in the statement.

The settlements grew out of an investigation by the attorney general's office of Direct Revenue LLC. In a suit filed in April 2006, the attorney general said New York-based Direct Revenue LLC installed more than 150 million ad-serving programs in consumers' computers, then ``deluged'' them with pop-up ads.

Under the terms of the agreements Priceline and Travelocity, both online travel agencies, and Cingular, a cell-phone company, will pay $35,000, $30,000 and $35,000, respectively. The money, to be paid to New York, covers penalties and the cost of the investigation. The agreements require each advertiser to deliver ads only through companies that provide full disclosure of their adware programs and any software bundled with it. They must also allow users to remove the adware.

Travelocity, Priceline and Cingular, among others, spent ``hundreds of thousands of dollars'' delivering ads through Direct Revenue software, the attorney general learned through its investigation, the statement said.

Priceline Comment

Priceline spokesman Brian Ek said in a statement that the company supported Cuomo's position on adware. He said Priceline has not used any adware providers since February 2006 and two months later enacted a policy that meets all the attorney general's requirements and published it on the company Web site.

Joel Frey, a spokesman for Travelocity, said the company had terminated its relationship with Direct Revenue in early 2006 and had fully cooperated with the New York attorney general in reaching the settlement.

Sabre Holdings Corp. owner of Travelocity, agreed earlier this month to be acquired for about $5 billion by buyout firms Silver Lake Partners and Texas Pacific Group.

Cingular is the wireless unit of AT&T Inc., the largest U.S. phone company. Cingular spokesman Mark Siegel said it has not had a relationship with Direct Revenue since at least October 2005 and does not use adware now. If does use it again, ``we will make sure any adware we might use gives notice to and gets consent from consumers,'' he said.

The 2006 suit against Direct Revenue, filed in Manhattan state Supreme Court, accused the company of deceptive practices, false advertising, trespassing onto computers, and computer tampering. Direct Revenue posted a rebuttal on its Web site, saying the attorney general focused on the company's ``past practices,'' which had changed long ago.

Shares of Priceline rose 28 cents to $42.57 at 4 p.m. in Nasdaq Stock Market composite trading. The stock rose 95 percent last year, the most since 2001. Shares of Sabre Holdings fell 2 cents to $32.30 in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. AT&T shares rose 11 cents to $36.51 on the same exchange. The stock advanced 46 percent last year.

To contact the reporter on this story: Karen Freifeld in New York at at kfreifeld@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: January 29, 2007 17:22 EST