San Francisco – The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has joined Consumer Reports, Access Now, PEN America, and DarkPatterns.org in launching the “Dark Patterns Tip Line”—a project for the public to submit examples of deceptive design patterns they see in technology products and services.
“Dark patterns” design tactics are used to trick people into doing all kinds of things they don’t mean to, from signing up for a mailing list to submitting to recurring billing. Examples seen by users every day include hard-to-close windows urging you to enter your email address on a news site, email opt-outs on shopping sites in difficult-to-find locations in difficult-to-read text, and pre-checked boxes allowing ongoing charges.