A bill is moving through the Iowa Legislature relating to stopping people from purchasing an abundance of tickets for an event. 

The Iowa Senate recently advanced Senate File 146, which will criminalize people that use the creation of bots in order to buy event tickets on the internet. District 14 Senator Sarah Trone-Garriott emphasizes that there’s been a rise of people utilizing automated software programs to purchase an absurd amount of tickets, then reselling them for a much higher price. 

She says that people are voicing their frustration as it gives them a disadvantage of not being able to have a chance to get tickets before they’re sold out. Trone-Garriott reveals that the bill was inspired after many people had trouble buying tickets to see musical pop-star Taylor Swift.

“It’s a good move in the right direction. And so when I was speaking on this bill on the (Senate) floor, I used a whole bunch of Taylor Swift references, just because it resonates with a lot of folks who really wanted to see her concerts recently and then were shut out because of these bots.”

Trone-Garriott notes the challenge is that it’s hard to penalize people before ticket sales, but states that ticket sellers can report suspicious activity to their local attorney general and they’ll work on taking legal action. She wants to hold scalpers accountable and believes that this is the first step to ending this immoral practice.