The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has initiated an investigation into several significant companies regarding their use of customer data, algorithms, and artificial intelligence to personalize pricing strategies.
A Coinbase poll indicates that Donald Trump and Kamala Harris are almost tied for support among cryptocurrency voters.
The FTC has issued orders to eight companies—Mastercard, JPMorgan Chase, Accenture, Task Software, McKinsey & Co., Revionics, Bloomreach, and Pros—requesting information about how these pricing approaches affect privacy, competition, and consumer protection.
Companies utilize tools such as AI to implement a practice referred to as “surveillance pricing,” or dynamic pricing, which allows them to display varying prices for the same products based on consumer characteristics and behaviors, including location, demographics, credit history, and shopping activity.
Many of these firms play a crucial role in providing transaction, sales, and pricing services to major U.S. and international companies. Task Software supports various hospitality giants, including McDonald’s and Starbucks. Revionics offers retail price optimization and analytics to numerous global retailers, including Home Depot. Pros is a software provider known for its AI-driven pricing solutions, with clientele that includes Nestlé, HP, and United Airlines, and it also partners in technology development with Microsoft.
The FTC aims to investigate this “opaque market” that categorizes shoppers and sets targeted prices based on personal data.
“Companies that collect personal data can jeopardize privacy. They could potentially exploit this extensive information to impose higher prices,” stated FTC Chair Lina Khan. “Americans deserve transparency regarding whether businesses are utilizing detailed consumer data for surveillance pricing, and this inquiry will illuminate the obscure ecosystem of pricing intermediaries.”
The FTC is seeking information in four primary areas: the types of surveillance pricing products and services offered by each company, data collection methods, customer and sales data, and how these practices affect pricing for customers.