The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has initiated an investigation into several major companies concerning their use of customer data, algorithms, and artificial intelligence for personalized pricing strategies.
Eight firms from various sectors—Mastercard, JPMorgan Chase, Accenture, Task Software, McKinsey & Co., Revionics, Bloomreach, and Pros—received inquiries from the agency seeking insights into how these pricing methods affect privacy, competition, and consumer rights.
These companies utilize data tools, often referred to as “surveillance pricing” or “dynamic pricing,” to display different prices to consumers for identical products based on various factors such as location, demographics, credit history, and browsing or shopping behavior.
Many of the firms approached by the FTC offer transaction, sales, and pricing services to some of the largest corporations in the United States and around the world. Task Software is responsible for transaction management for major hospitality businesses, including McDonald’s and Starbucks. Revionics provides retail price optimization tools and analytics for several international retailers, including Home Depot. Pros is a software company emphasizing AI-driven pricing solutions and counts Nestlé, HP, and United Airlines among its clientele. Pros also collaborates with Microsoft as a technology development partner.
The FTC aims to clarify this “opaque market” that categorizes shoppers and establishes targeted pricing for products and services. According to FTC Chair Lina Khan, “Firms that harvest Americans’ personal data can put people’s privacy at risk. Now firms could be exploiting this vast trove of personal information to charge people higher prices. Americans deserve to know whether businesses are using detailed consumer data to deploy surveillance pricing, and the FTC’s inquiry will shed light on this shadowy ecosystem of pricing middlemen.”
The agency is specifically seeking information regarding four main areas: the types of surveillance pricing products and services provided by each company; methods of data collection; customer and sales data; and how these surveillance practices affect the prices consumers ultimately pay.