A form of digital discrimination is quietly costing Californians billions | Opinion

Imagine going to buy a pair of shoes or book a hotel room, only to find out you’re being charged more than someone else — for the exact same item — simply because of your ZIP code, income level or online behavior. That’s not a glitch. That’s surveillance pricing. And it’s happening to Californians every single day.

Surveillance pricing is the use of your personal data — information like where you live, how much you make and your search history — to manipulate the price you see. It’s a digital form of discrimination, and it’s quietly costing California consumers billions.

This isn’t hypothetical: In 2015, The Princeton Review was caught charging more for tutoring services in ZIP codes with large Asian American populations; Target was fined $5 million in 2022 for raising in-store prices when shoppers were physically near a store; and last year, a report to the Federal Trade Commission revealed that companies are being encouraged to use discriminatory pricing algorithms to pad their profits.

Washington, D.C., has stalled on progress. So California is taking the lead.

That’s why I authored the Surveillance Pricing Protection Act (Assembly Bill 446) to ban this practice outright. The legislation ensures that every consumer in California pays the same fair price — regardless of who they are, where they live or how an algorithm categorizes them.

This isn’t about dynamic pricing, where prices fluctuate with demand. This is about charging you more because of who you are or who a computer model thinks you are. That’s profiling and exploitation.

One of my colleagues in the Assembly recently defended this practice, saying consumers should “put in the work” to spot when they’re being charged more. But most people don’t even know it’s happening — let alone have the time or tools to test pricing online as if they were a different person.

This is not the future Californians signed up for.

Supporters of surveillance pricing try to rebrand it as “personalization.” But what it really does is hide discrimination behind a wall of code. When your data — not the product — determines the price, fairness becomes a luxury few can afford.

AB 446 won’t ban discounts. Deals for students, veterans or loyalty members will still be allowed as long as they’re clearly posted. This bill simply bans secret price discrimination. We’ve outlawed redlining in housing and employment. Retail and online shopping should be held to the same standard.

This story was originally published July 12, 2025 at 6:00 AM with the headline "A form of digital discrimination is quietly costing Californians billions | Opinion."