JavaScript isn't enabled in your browser, so this file can't be opened. Enable and reload.

1 of 10

Dark Patterns:�Introduction

2 of 10

Contents

What are Dark Patterns?
Why are they called that?
Why should I care?

3 of 10

What are Dark Patterns?

Some websites use tricks to make people agree to share more data than they intended to, or to spend more money than they planned to.

User Interface experts got together and categorized a number of these tricks that are commonly found on websites, and called them Dark Patterns.

4 of 10

What are Dark Patterns?

Gray, et al. (2018) defined them as “instances where designers use their knowledge of human behavior (e.g., psychology) and the desires of end users to implement deceptive functionality that is not in the user’s best interest”

Gray, C.M., Kou, Y., Battles, B., Hoggatt, J. and Toombs, A.L., 2018, April. The dark (patterns) side of UX design. In Proceedings of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 1-14).

5 of 10

Why are they called that?

Dark Patterns get their name from an existing concept in computer science called Design Patterns.

Design patterns are a series of general, reusable solutions to a commonly occurring computer programming problems.

They generally refer to the style of the computer program itself, whereas Dark Patterns focus on the Interface.

6 of 10

Why should I care?

Dark Patterns deceptively get people to give their data and money away.

You or a family member are vulnerable to these misleading interfaces. No matter how careful you are, some are extremely effective.

7 of 10

Brignull’s Dark Patterns

Trick questions
Sneak into Basket
Roach Motel
Privacy Zuckering
Price Comparison Prevention
Misdirection

Hidden Costs
Bait and Switch
Confirmshaming
Disguised Ads
Forced Continuity
Friend Spam

https://darkpatterns.org/types-of-dark-pattern.html

8 of 10

Brignull’s Dark Patterns

https://darkpatterns.org/types-of-dark-pattern.html

DARK PATTERNS	HOW DOES IT AFFECT ME?
Sneak into Basket	“I never put that item in my basket ..”
Hidden Costs	“It was such a good deal…. until delivery charge was double the price of It ...”
Confirmshaming	“I really don’t want it but I feel silly not taking it ...”
Trick Questions	“I never opted-in to that. Why are they emailing me?”
Misdirection	“How did I not see that I had subscribed to that?”
Disguised Ads	“I just clicked on an ad when I thought I was pressing the download button ..”
Roach Motel	“I don’t want to subscribe anymore but I can’t get out ..”
Forced Continuity	“I had a free trial but I don’t want to subscribe now .. How can I get out of it?”
Privacy Zuckering	“How can people see my posts? My privacy settings should prevent this ..”
Bait & Switch	“Why did that happen? As far as I am aware I did not do it ..”
Friend Spam	“Why is my email being spammed?”
Price Comparison Prevention	“I can’t find the price for the plans that are being described ..”

9 of 10

A Categorisation of Dark Patterns

* https://arxiv.org/pdf/1907.07032.pdf

Mathur et al.(2019)*		Brignull's 12 (2010)
Sneaking	Sneak in Basket	Sneak in Basket
	Hidden Costs	Hidden Costs
	Hidden Subscription
Misdirection	Confirm shaming	Confirm shaming
	Trick Questions	Trick Questions
	Visual Interference	Misdirection
	Pressured Selling	Disguised ads
Obstruction	Roach Motels	Roach Motels
Forced Action	Forced Enrollment	Forced Continuity
Other		Bait & Switch
		Friend Spam
		Privacy Zuckering
		Price Comparison Prevention
Fake Urgency	Fake countdown
	Sales with Ambiguous deadline
Fake social proof	Fake activity
	Testimonials/Reviews
False Scarcity	Low Stock Messages

10 of 10

Acknowledgements

#CheckYourTech

The authors of these slides and the participants of the Ethics4EU project gratefully acknowledge the support of the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union. The European Commission's support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents, which reflect the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

www.Ethics4EU.eu

#Ethics4EU