Parliament voted down a motion on April 15 to ban a practice most Canadians have never heard of, but that retailers are already rolling out: surveillance pricing.
Also called algorithmic personalized pricing, the practice uses personal data to estimate how much consumers are willing to pay, then adjusts the price accordingly. Two shoppers, same store, same item: two different prices, generated by data neither of them can see.
The NDP motion urges the government to prohibit surveillance pricing both in stores and online. The Liberals and Conservatives voted it down. NDP leader Avi Lewis had called the practice “unfair” and “downright creepy” at a news conference days earlier.
