Access Over Deception: Fighting Deceptive Patterns through Accessibility

TL;DR

This paper explores how accessibility standards like WCAG and legislation such as the EAA can be used to combat deceptive UI patterns, analyzing their violations and potential as regulatory tools.

Contribution

It introduces a heuristic evaluation method to assess how deceptive patterns relate to accessibility guidelines and legislation, highlighting specific patterns implicated by these standards.

Findings

No significant difference in violations across pattern types

Countdown Timer, Auto-Play, and Hidden Information are linked to WCAG guidelines

Accessibility standards can serve as tools against deceptive UI patterns

Abstract

Deceptive patterns, dark patterns, and manipulative user interfaces (UI) are a widely used design strategy that manipulates users to act against their own interests in pursuit of shareholder aims. These patterns may particularly affect people with less education, visual impairments, and older adults. Yet, access is a critical feature of the user experience (UX), development standards, and law. We considered whether and how the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) and related legislation, like the European Accessibility Act (EAA), could act as a tool against deceptive patterns. We used heuristic evaluation to analyze whether and how deceptive patterns violate or conform to these guidelines and legal statutes. Although statistical analysis revealed no significant differences by pattern type, we identified three patterns implicated by the WCAG guidelines: Countdown Timer, Auto-Play, and Hidden Information. We offer this approach as one tool in the fight against UI-based deception and in support of inclusive design.