New York weighs ban on grocery surveillance pricing

A shopper comparing the price of milk, diapers or aspirin in New York could end up paying more because an app knows what they buy, when they get paid and how long they linger over an item online. That is the consumer-rights fight now moving through Albany, where Attorney General Letitia James backed the One Fair Price Package in March 2026 and urged lawmakers to stop what supporters call surveillance pricing before it reaches the grocery aisle and the pharmacy counter.

One bill, the One Fair Price Act, would ban surveillance pricing statewide. The second, the Protecting Consumers and Jobs from Discriminatory Pricing Act, would go further by banning electronic shelf labels and prohibiting surveillance pricing in grocery stores and pharmacies. James’s office says online platforms can collect thousands of data points about a shopper, from purchases and pay cycles to hover time on a product page, then feed that information into algorithms that estimate the highest price a person is likely to accept. Supporters say the aim is simple: the same item should carry the same price for everyone, while legitimate discounts and loyalty programs would still be allowed.

New York’s push comes as federal regulators have expanded their own scrutiny. The Federal Trade Commission sent 6(b) orders in July 2024 to eight companies, including Mastercard, Revionics, Bloomreach, JPMorgan Chase, Task Software, PROS, Accenture and McKinsey & Co. In January 2025, FTC staff said data such as precise location, browser history, mouse movements and abandoned-cart behavior can be used to tailor prices, and that intermediaries can sit on a wide swath of data types and sources. The agency’s inquiry sharpened the national debate over whether companies should be allowed to charge different shoppers different prices for the same goods and services.

Albany has already moved once on the issue. Gov. Kathy Hochul signed the Algorithmic Pricing Disclosure Act on May 9, 2025, and it took effect in November 2025, requiring disclosures when algorithmic pricing based on personal data is used online. The National Retail Federation sued New York on July 2, 2025, arguing the disclosure rule violated retailers’ First Amendment rights. The new package would test a different line: not just warning shoppers that surveillance pricing exists, but banning it outright in essentials that families cannot easily do without.

That concern sharpened after a December 2025 report from Groundwork Collaborative, Consumer Reports and More Perfect Union found Instacart price experiments could charge some shoppers up to 23% more for the same item at the same time. Average basket totals varied by about 7%, and for a family of four the premium could reach roughly $1,200 a year. For New York lawmakers, the question is no longer abstract. It is whether groceries, medicine and diapers should be priced by supply and demand, or by a hidden profile built from the data trail a shopper leaves behind.