Congress moves to kill subscription traps and dark patterns
S. 2266 — Consumer Online Payment Transparency and Integrity Act · Filed by Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) · 11 cosponsors · Introduced Jul 14, 2025 · Referred to committee
Your members of Congress
Enter a ZIP to see where your representative and both senators stood on this bill.
Looked up on this device — your ZIP is never stored on our servers.
What it does
This bill requires companies that offer automatic renewal services (like free trials that convert to paid subscriptions, or negative-option features) to clearly disclose the terms, notify consumers 7+ days before each charge, obtain fresh consent annually and when services go unused for 6 months, provide easy cancellation methods (online, phone, email, mail), and ban dark patterns (deceptive UI tricks). Violations void the renewal and trigger refunds. The FTC enforces it as unfair/deceptive practice.
Why we flagged it
The bill's core mechanism is a consumer-protection mandate requiring transparency, consent, and easy cancellation for automatic renewal contracts. It is not a tax measure, appropriation, or deregulation—it is affirmative regulation of a specific consumer harm.
What the text implies
- The 1-year implementation window allows companies time to redesign systems but may delay relief for consumers currently trapped in hard-to-cancel subscriptions.
- FTC rulemaking authority (section 3(b)(4)) on dark patterns is broad and may extend beyond auto-renewals to other consent-based transactions, expanding the bill's practical scope.
- Service contract exemption (section 2(f)) carves out vehicle/property service contracts, which may include auto-renewal features not subject to these protections.
- Annual re-consent requirement may create friction for legitimate subscribers but also creates compliance burden for companies with millions of active subscriptions.
Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.
Who it affects
Ordinary consumers gain enforceable rights to clear disclosure, advance notice, easy cancellation, and refunds when companies violate the rules. The bill directly addresses a widespread consumer harm (surprise charges, hard-to-cancel subscriptions, dark patterns) and shifts power back to consumers by requiring affirmative consent rather than silence-as-acceptance.
Named in the bill
Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Subscription services (streaming, software, fitness, etc.), Free trial platforms, Negative option feature providers
Where it stands
11 cosponsors: 10 Democrats, 1 Independents.
- Jul 14, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
- Jul 14, 2025 — Referred to Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
2 lobbying clients named this bill on 4 disclosure filings across 2 quarters, Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $6,350,000 in lobbying spend. A filing names 84 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 41% of bills with at least one filing.
Chris Van Hollen, the sponsor, reported $81,250 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.
- American Property Casualty Insurance Association — $3,540,000 on 2 filings
- Entertainment Software Association — $2,810,000 on 2 filings
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 22, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (7,239 characters) on May 21, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 22, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
“Congress moves to kill subscription traps and dark patterns” QuorumCivic. https://share.quorumcivic.app/bill/119/s2266 Report an error
The week in bills
One email, Sunday: what Congress passed, what it changed, and who paid.
One link arrives to confirm the address. It is used for this email and nothing else, and every issue carries an unsubscribe link.