On November 15, 2012, the UK Office of Fair Trading (the “OFT”) launched a call for information to investigate whether offering “personalized pricing” based on data companies collect about consumers’ online behavior violates consumer protection legislation in the UK.
The OFT will look at how companies gather data related to “consumers’ browsing history, purchases, demographic, hardware, operating system, etc and use this to personalise products and prices.” In particular, as indicated on the OFT’s website, the OFT will analyze:
evidence from media investigations and reports which have alleged that companies use data to modify prices offered to consumers based on their browsing history or other observed data; and
whether consumers have enough control over what data gets passed or sold on to third parties, in particular, whether companies offer clear information to consumers about what data they need in order to provide the product or services, or whether companies are acquiring data simply to sell on to others.
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