What’s In a Name?
Unpacking Dark Patterns versus Deceptive Design
Have you heard of a dark pattern before? If you use the Internet, you’ve probably encountered one.
Have you ever unsubscribed from an email listserv just to get the same email the next week? You probably encountered a dark pattern. If you’ve ever seen countdown clocks on e-commerce platforms or tried to purchase a plane ticket only to have numerous confusing fees pop up, those are dark patterns too. Or, if you live in the EU, and have tried to read an online blog in the past few years, you’ve probably encountered a GDPR cookie banner with a dark pattern (when GDPR was first rolled out, it was riddled with them). All of these examples are ‘dark patterns’.
One of the things I do, aside from writing here, and making art, is run a human rights design and research lab. One of our research projects is on dark patterns and their impacts on policy, technology, and consumers. Over the next few months, some of my articles in this column will be on dark patterns. And one of the first topics I want to address is ‘should dark patterns even be called dark patterns?’
Harry Brignull, a designer, researcher and creator of the term dark patterns, defines dark patterns as “ a manipulative or deceptive trick in software that gets users to complete an action that they would not…
