Dynamic pricing: Bay Area lawmaker's bill would ban retailers using phone data to increase prices
Briefly

Senator Aisha Wahab has introduced legislation to prohibit retailers from using artificial intelligence to adjust prices based on the data from customers' phones. This initiative targets dynamic pricing practices that can vary prices arbitrarily based on consumer information. Wahab's objective is to maintain fair pricing across different demographics, addressing price discrimination linked to socioeconomic status. Support for the bill includes various labor and consumer rights groups, while some tech organizations and the California Chamber of Commerce believe it may hinder innovation and inflate prices. Awareness of dynamic pricing issues among consumers is notably limited.
Senator Aisha Wahab has introduced a bill that would prevent retailers from using artificial intelligence to increase prices by using the information stored on customers' phones. This is aimed at stopping the practice of dynamic pricing, where prices fluctuate based on consumer data. Wahab's motivation is to create an equal playing field for consumers, regardless of their socioeconomic status, by preventing price discrimination based on the data from devices like smartphones.
Carmen Balber, the executive director of Consumer Watchdog, mentions that many consumers are unaware of dynamic pricing. The online price they see is often just one point of view, and individuals may encounter significantly different pricing based on their location or other factors, without any transparency.
Read at ABC7 San Francisco
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