Colorado House passes bill to limit surveillance pricing and wage setting

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Brief

The Colorado House of Representatives passed a bill on Friday that aims to rein in companies’ use of personal data and opaque algorithms to set individualized prices on products like plane tickets and groceries.

House Bill 26-1210 passed the House on a 39-24 vote.

It would ban the practice of sending someone’s data through an algorithm to determine their wage or the price of a product. That could include data like a person’s search history, finances, online habits and the way they interact with a store’s website or phone app.

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“Everybody understands that our phones have become extensions of our brains,” said bill sponsor Rep. Javier Mabrey, a Denver Democrat. “We put our most intimate thoughts into our phones — our texts, our searches, our geolocation data — and the biggest companies in the world are collecting that data and selling it to other companies, who are using it to decide how much to charge us as individuals for things like plane tickets, groceries, medicine for when your kids are sick.”

The bill would not limit loyalty programs, coupons or discounts for groups like veterans and teachers. It also would not consider price fluctuations based on supply and demand as surveillance pricing.

A 2025 report from the Federal Trade Commission found that as artificial intelligence advances, companies are more able to adjust prices based on what they can glean from detailed, individual consumer characteristics. Prices are increasingly multi-dimensional, the report concluded, and can be different based on personal data and audience segmenting.

Multiple states are considering similar bills this year, mostly related to consumer disclosure. New York became the first state last November to require disclosure of algorithmic price setting using personal data.

“There is a reason why we have antitrust laws,” bill sponsor Rep. Jennifer Bacon, a Denver Democrat, said. “There is a reason why we have anti-deceptive practices laws, and it’s to protect the consumer’s ability to actually engage. This is the 21st century version of it.”

The bill would make surveillance pricing a deceptive trade practice enforceable by the attorney general.

Republican Rep. Chris Richardson, an Elbert County Republican, argued that the bill is too broad and could regulate standard analytic usage in the workplace, such as a human resources software that recommends a pay band for employees based on performance.

“I absolutely agree that consumers and wage earners should not be exploited by the use of their data,” he said. “But it’s still overly broad and it’s still overly vague in very important parts. And I believe it’s overly simplistic in its definition of wage setting.”

The bill now moves on to the Senate for consideration.

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