The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has initiated an investigation into several prominent companies regarding their utilization of customer data, algorithms, and artificial intelligence for personalized pricing strategies.
Eight companies from various sectors—Mastercard, JPMorgan Chase, Accenture, Task Software, McKinsey & Co., Revionics, Bloomreach, and Pros—received information demands from the FTC on Tuesday. The agency seeks to understand the implications of these pricing strategies for privacy, competition, and consumer protection.
These companies employ data-driven tools, including AI, in a practice referred to as “surveillance pricing” or “dynamic pricing.” This approach allows them to present different prices to consumers for identical products based on several factors, such as location, demographics, credit history, and online behavior.
Many of the firms under investigation provide transaction, sales, and pricing services to some of the largest corporations in the United States and worldwide. Task is responsible for transaction management for several major hospitality brands, including McDonald’s and Starbucks. Revionics specializes in retail price optimization software and analytics for global chains, including Home Depot. Pros, which markets itself as a provider of AI-driven pricing solutions, has a client roster that includes Nestlé, HP, and United Airlines, and it collaborates with Microsoft for technology development.
The FTC aims to clarify the “opaque market” where shopper categorization and targeted pricing for goods and services occur.
“Companies that collect personal data from Americans may jeopardize their privacy. These businesses may exploit a vast amount of personal information to impose higher prices,” FTC Chair Lina Khan stated. “Americans have the right to understand whether businesses are using detailed consumer data for surveillance pricing, and this inquiry will illuminate the unclear practices of pricing intermediaries.”
The FTC is focused on four primary areas: the types of surveillance pricing products and services offered, data collection methods, customer and sales information, and the impact of these practices on the prices consumers ultimately pay.