New Guidelines On Sneaky Dark Patterns On Digital Experiences, Launched By The Central Consumer Protection Authority.
Central consumer protection authority has launched the prevention & regulation guideline on dark patterns recently!
According to the Central Consumer Protection Authority, Dark patterns shall mean any practices or deceptive design pattern using user interface or user experience interactions on any platform that is designed to mislead or trick users into doing something they originally did not intend or want to do, by subverting or impairing the consumer autonomy, decision making or choice, amounting to a misleading advertisement or unfair trade practice or violation of consumer rights.
Let’s understand that with a simple example: BookMyShow has a charity initiative, for which each ticket booking will be charged Rs.2, which is optional, but added by default to the total amount. This is a dark pattern.
There are 13 kinds of Specified Dark Patterns under the guidelines.
1. False urgency
This involves misleading users by falsely creating a sense of urgency or scarcity to prompt immediate purchases or actions. This can include tactics like presenting the false popularity of a product, exaggerating limited quantities, and using time-bound pressure.
Example:
- “Only 2 rooms left! 30 others are looking at this right now”, which is presenting false data on high demand without appropriate context.
- Falsely creating time-bound pressure to make a purchase, such as banks describing a card as an ‘exclusive’ offer for a limited time only for a select group of users.
2. Basket Sneaking
It refers to the practice of adding extra items or charges, such as products, services, or charitable donations, to a user’s checkout without their explicit consent. This results in the user paying more than the initially selected product or service. It is important to note that the inclusion of disclosed necessary fees, like delivery charges or government-mandated taxes, is not considered basket-sneaking
Example:
- A user purchases a single salon service, but while checking out, a subscription to the salon service is automatically added
- Cleartrip adds travel insurance while a user purchases a flight ticket.
3. Confirm Shaming
It involves the use of phrases, videos, audio, or other methods to instill fear, shame, ridicule, or guilt in a user’s mind. This manipulation is aimed at coercing the user into taking a specific action, such as purchasing a product or continuing a subscription on a platform. The primary motive behind “confirm shaming” is to exploit consumer choice for commercial gains.
Example:
- A platform for booking flight tickets using the phrase “I will stay unsecured” when a user does not include insurance in their cart.
4. Forced Action
It refers to compelling a user to take an action that necessitates the purchase of additional goods, subscription to unrelated services, or the sharing of personal information. This coercion is imposed as a prerequisite for buying or subscribing to the originally intended product or service by the user.
Example:
- Forcing a user to subscribe to a newsletter to purchase a product.
- Forcing a user to share details of his contacts or social networks to access products or services purchased or intended to be purchased by the user.
5. Subscription Trap
It involves making it challenging to cancel a paid subscription, hiding the cancellation option, requiring users to provide payment details or authorizing auto-debits for a free subscription, and creating unclear or confusing instructions for cancellation.
6. Interface Interference
is when a design deliberately draws attention to some information while hiding other important details to lead users away from the intended action.
Example:
- An ‘X’ icon on the top-right corner of a pop-up screen leads to opening-up of another advertisement rather than closing it
7. Bait & Switch
is the deceptive practice of advertising a specific result based on the user’s action but then providing a different outcome.
Example:
- A seller offers a quality product at a cheap price but when the consumer is about to pay or buy, the seller states that the product is no longer available and instead offers a similar-looking product but more expensive
8. Drip Pricing
is a tricky practice where certain parts of the price are not shown upfront or are sneakily revealed during the user experience. It can also involve disclosing the full price only after the user has confirmed their purchase, and it might be higher than what was initially shown at checkout. Sometimes, products or services are advertised as free without making it clear that you’ll need to buy things within the app to keep using them. Another sneaky move is when you’ve paid for a service, but you can’t use it fully unless you make extra purchases.
However, it’s important to note that a marketplace e-commerce entity is not responsible for price changes caused by third-party sellers or factors beyond their control.
Example:
- A consumer is booking a flight, the online platform showcases the price as X at the checkout page, and when payment is being made, price Y (which is more than X) has been charged by the platform to the consumer
9. Disguised advertisement
refers to the deceptive practice of presenting advertisements in a way that camouflages them as different types of content, such as user-generated content, news articles, or false advertisements. The intention is to make these ads blend seamlessly with the overall interface, aiming to deceive customers into clicking on them.
10. Nagging
refers to a dark pattern practice where a user experiences constant disruption and irritation through repeated and persistent interactions, such as requests, information prompts, or interruptions.
An example of “nagging” in the digital realm is when a website repeatedly prompts users with pop-ups asking them to subscribe to newsletters or notifications. Also, constant requests to turn on or accept notifications or cookies with no option to say “NO”.
11. Trick Question
refers to using confusing language like double negatives, to misguide users from taking a desired task to something that would yield gain to the company.
12. SAAS Billing
is the way of regularly collecting payments in a software-as-a-service (SaaS) business model. It involves cleverly using positive acquisition loops in recurring subscriptions to get money from users as discreetly as possible.
Example: Silently recurring transactions whereby the user’s account is debited without being notified or simply stated auto-renewing monthly subscriptions without telling users.
13. Rogue Malware
means using ransomware or scareware to mislead or trick a user into believing there is a virus on their computer and aims to convince them to pay for a fake malware removal tool that installs malware on their computer.
Example: When a pirating website/app promises the consumer to provide free content (audio or audio-visual or others) but leads to embedded malware when the link is accessed.
These are the identified & prohibited dark patterns as of now by the CENTRAL CONSUMER PROTECTION AUTHORITY of India
For the full article, here is the link: https://media.licdn.com/dms/document/media/D561FAQEWxBdft7Nuyw/feedshare-document-pdf-analyzed/0/1701492430312?e=1702512000&v=beta&t=l1XioPBEAOTYSc-1Vy2uDBT8gpl4m-nBvoKYbrYPTKw
