The FTC wants to know if your airfare knows who you are

The Federal Trade Commission has ordered Delta Air Lines, United Airlines and JetBlue, alongside Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, Instacart, Target and Walmart, to hand over detailed data on how they set prices and, for the gig platforms, how they pay workers. The orders were issued under Section 6(b) of the FTC Act. If a company fails to turn over the required information, the Commission has the power to compel compliance in federal court.

Delta disclosed in 2024 that it was testing AI-assisted fare technology built with a firm called Fetcherr. In responses to the new inquiry, Delta and JetBlue denied using personal data to set individualised fares, with Delta saying it had never used, tested or planned to use a product that targets customers with personalised offers based on personal data.

“Consumers deserve to know whether companies use their web surfing habits or other personal data”

That fragment, from FTC Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson, frames the inquiry as a correction to a 2024 study that questioned pricing consultancies rather than the companies actually setting prices. That study examined only middlemen consultancies rather than the businesses that actually set prices for services and products offered to consumers, and the agency learned nothing about actual pricing decisions from it. Going straight to the companies is the more useful approach for finding out what the algorithms do, rather than what the industry selling them claims.

Nobody has shown that any of the nine companies charges two customers different prices for the same seat or cart based on who they are, and the airlines have been quick to deny it. What the inquiry tests is whether the tools now available to do that quietly, at scale, are being used that way, and whether anyone outside the companies would otherwise know.