TY  - JOUR
T1  - The role of dark patterns in manipulating users in digital environments
TT  - Dijital ortamlarda kullanıcıların yönlendirilmesinde karanlık tasarımların rolü
AU  - Merhan, İrem
AU  - Güneş Peschke, Seldağ
PY  - 2025
DA  - June
Y2  - 2025
JF  - im: İletişim ve medya çalışmaları dergisi
PB  - Baskent University
WT  - DergiPark
SN  - 3108-3633
SP  - 121
EP  - 140
IS  - 1
LA  - en
AB  - Dark patterns are described as digital design patterns that entice users to take actions that counter to their “real” interests or that they would not otherwise have undertaken. Dark patterns may pose challenges in digital environments by infringing users’ fundamental rights. These deceptive practices may lead users to unknowingly undertake financial obligations; their personal data processed without permission or become parties in contracts they did not intend to enter. Therefore, legal regulations alone are not sufficient enough; preventive strategies must also be identified, digital literacy must be improved, and users must be aware of their rights. In this context, the article defines the concept of dark patterns and analyses the difficulty of identifying such designs and the lack of specific regulations in national and international levels. Current rules on dark patterns are mostly regulated under general consumer protection rights and unfair competition provisions. This situation has been assessed as facilitating the continuation of manipulative practices by platforms and creates a significant gap in the effective protection of user rights. Furthermore, the study highlights lawsuits against large-scale companies and discusses the need to strengthen the regulatory framework through concrete cases.
KW  - information technology law
KW  - dark patterns
KW  - user experience
KW  - unfair commercial practices
KW  - data privacy
N2  - Karanlık tasarımlar kullanıcıları “gerçek” isteklerine veya çıkarlarına aykırı olarak hareket etmeye veya normalde gerçekleştirmeyecekleri eylemleri yapmaya teşvik eden dijital tasarım desenleri olarak tanımlanabilir. Son yıllarda sıklıkla kullanılan bu tasarımlar, dijital ortamlarda kullanıcıların bilgilendirilme, rıza gösterme ve sözleşmeden cayma gibi temel haklarını ihlal ederek ciddi sorunlara yol açabilmektedir. Bu tür uygulamalar, kullanıcıların farkında olmadan finansal yükümlülükler üstlenmesine, kişisel verilerinin izinsiz işlenmesine veya istemedikleri sözleşmelere taraf olmalarına ve bunun sonucunda birçok davanın açılmasına da neden olabilmektedir. Karanlık tasarımların tespiti ve manipülatif etkilerinin ortaya konması yapısal olarak güçtür. Bu nedenle, yalnızca hukuki düzenlemelerle yetinilmemeli; dijital okuryazarlığın artırılması ve kullanıcı bilincinin güçlendirilmesine yönelik önleyici stratejiler de ulusal ve uluslararası düzeyde ele alınmalıdır. Bu bağlamda yapılan çalışmada, kullanıcıları manipüle etmeye yönelik karanlık tasarımlar kavramsal olarak tanımlanmış; bu tasarımların saptanmasının güçlüğü, ülkeler bazında özel düzenlemelerin eksikliği belirlenmiştir. Karanlık tasarımlara yönelik mevcut hukuki düzenlemelerin çoğunlukla genel tüketici haklarına ilişkin kurallar ile haksız rekabet hükümlerine dayanması, karanlık tasarımlara ilişkin özel kanunların olmaması, platformların manipülatif uygulamaları sürdürmesini kolaylaştırdığı gibi kullanıcıların haklarının korunmasında da ciddi bir boşluk yaratmaktadır. Bu nedenle, çalışmada, karanlık tasarımları kullanan, büyük ölçekli şirketlere karşı açılan örnek davalara yer verilmiş, düzenleyici çerçevenin güçlendirilmesine duyulan ihtiyaç somut vakalar üzerinden tartışılmıştır.
CR  - Akhurst, T., Zurdo, L., Rapparini, R. & Mautner Markhof, C. (2023). How should the European Union regulate dark patterns?. SciencesPo. https://www.sciencespo.fr/public/chaire-numerique/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/Dark-Patterns.pdf
CR  - Başer, E. & Akıncı, S. (2020). Kullanıcı deneyimi ve kişiselleştirme bağlamında bir dijital platform incelemesi. Selçuk İletişim, 13(2), 866-897. https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/pub/josc/issue/55089/688523
CR  - Bösch, C., Erb, B., Kargl, F., Kopp, H. & Pfattheicher, S. (2016). Tales from the dark side: Privacy dark strategies and privacy dark patterns. Proceedings on privacy enhancing technologies, 4, 237-254. https://doi.org/10.1515/popets-2016-0038
CR  - Brignull, H. (2023). Deceptive patterns: Exposing the tricks tech companies use to control you. https://www.deceptive.design/book/contents/part-1
CR  - Cara, C. (2019). Dark patterns in the media: A systematic review. Network intelligence studies, 7(14), 105-113. https://seaopenresearch.eu/Journals/articles/NIS_14_3.pdf
CR  - Conti, G. & Sobiesk, E. (2010). Malicious interface design: Exploiting the user. WWW '10: Proceedings of the 19th international conference on world wide web, 271-280. http://doi.org/10.1145/1772690.1772719
CR  - Çeken, B. & Delil, S. (2021). Arayüzlerde hacim ilhamı: Yaratıcı UI tasarım konseptlerinde 3 boyutlu grafikler. Dünya İnsan Bilimleri, 2, 68-83.
CR  - European Parliament & Council of the European Union. (1993, April 5). Directive 93/13/EEC of 5 April 1993 on unfair terms in consumer contracts (Unfair Contract Terms Directive). Official journal of the European communities, L 95, 29-34. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/1993/13/oj
CR  - European Parliament & Council of the European Union. (2002, September 23). Directive 2002/65/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 September 2002 on the distance marketing of consumer financial services (Distance Marketing of Consumer Financial Services Directive). Official journal of the European communities, L 279, 16-28. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2002/65/oj
CR  - European Parliament & Council of the European Union. (2005, May 11). Directive 2005/29/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 May 2005 concerning unfair business-to-consumer commercial practices in the internal market (Unfair Commercial Practices Directive). Official journal of the European Union, L 149, 22-39. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:32005L0029
CR  - European Parliament & Council of the European Union. (2016, April 27). Directive 2016/679/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data (General Data Protection Regulation). Official journal of the European Union, L 119, 1-88. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2016/679/oj
CR  - European Parliament & Council of the European Union. (2022, September 14). Regulation (EU) 2022/1925 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 October 2022 on contestable and fair markets in the digital sector (Digital Markets Act). Official Journal of the European Union, L 265, 1-42. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2022/1925/oj
CR  - European Parliament & Council of the European Union. (2024, June 13). Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 13 June 2024 laying down harmonised rules on artificial intelligence and amending Regulations (EC) No 300/2008, (EU) No 167/2013, (EU) No 168/2013, (EU) 2018/858, (EU) 2018/1139 and (EU) 2019/2144 and Directives 2014/90/EU, (EU) 2016/797 and (EU) 2020/1828 (Artificial Intelligence Act) (OJ L 2024/1689, 12.7.2024, 1-144). https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2024/1689/oj
CR  - FTC. (2022, November 3). FTC action against Vonage results in $100 million for customers trapped by illegal dark patterns and junk fees when trying to cancel service. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2022/11/ftc-action-against-vonage-results-100-million-customers-trapped-illegal-dark-patterns-junk-fees-when-trying-cancel-service
CR  - Folkvord, F., Peschke, L., Gümüş Ağca, Y., van Houten, K., Stazi, G., Roca-Umbert, A., Güneş Peschke, Z. S., Seyfafjehi, S., Gallego, A., Gaeta, E., Fico, G., Karinsalo, A. & Lupiáñez-Villanueva, F. (2022, June 24). Preferences in the intention to download a COVID tracing app: A discrete choice experiment study in the Netherlands and Turkey. Frontiers in communication, 7. https://doi.org/10.3389/fcomm.2022.900066
CR  - Gençtürk Hızal, G. S. (2005). Reklam endüstrisinin topografyası: Türkiye örneği. İletişim araştırmaları, 3(1-2), 105-131.
CR  - Gray, C. M., Kou, Y., Battles, B., Hoggatt, J. & Toombs, A. L. (2018). The dark (patterns) side of UX design. Proceedings of the 2018 CHI conference on human factors in computing systems, 1-14. https://doi.org/10.1145/3173574.3174108
CR  - Gray, C. M., Santos, C., Bielova, N. (2023) Towards a preliminary ontology of dark patterns knowledge. Extended abstracts of the 2023 CHI conference on human factors in computing systems, 286, 1-9. https://doi.org/10.1145/3544549.3585676
CR  - Güneş Peschke, S., Aydoğdu, Y. & Peschke, L. (2022). İnternet sitelerinin ve mobil uygulamaların çerez (cookies) politikalarında dezenformasyon ve hukuki boyutu. B. Kent, Y. Söyler & M. A. Kulular İbrahim (Ed.), İnternet hukukunda dezenformasyonla mücadele (p. 17-38). On İki Levha.
CR  - Hroch, M., Kompatsiaris, P., Grassmuck, V., Moreno, J., Peschke, L., Jirák, J. & Poddar, D. (2024). Futures of algorithms and choices: Structuration of algorithmic imaginaries and digital platforms in Europe. Central European journal of communication, 17(1), 38-60. https://doi.org/10.51480/1899-5101.17.1(35).707
CR  - ISO. (2010). Ergonomics of human-system interaction — Part 210: Human-centred design for interactive systems (ISO Standard No. 9241-210:2010). https://www.iso.org/standard/52075.html
CR  - Koca, Y. & Güneş Peschke, Z. S. (2023). Dijital hizmetler yasası ve dijital piyasalar yasası kapsamında çevrim içi davranışsal reklamcılık faaliyetlerinin değerlendirilmesi. Yargıtay, 49(4), 827-864.
CR  - Lu, Y., Yang, Y., Zhao, Q., Zhang, C. & Li, T. J. J. (2024). AI assistance for UX: A literature review through human-centered AI. arXiv:2402.06089v2. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2402.06089
CR  - Luguri, J. & Strahilevitz, L. J. (2021). Shining a light on dark patterns. Journal of legal analysis, 13(1), 43-109. https://doi.org/10.1093/jla/laaa006
CR  - Lupiáñez-Villanueva, F., Boluda, A., Bogliacino, F., Liva, G., Lechardoy, L. & Rodríguez de las Heras Ballell, T. (2022). Behavioural study on unfair commercial practices in the digital environment: Dark patterns and manipulative personalisation: Final report. Publications office of the European Union. https://data.europa.eu/doi/10.2838/859030
CR  - Maier, M. & Harr, R. (2020). Dark design patterns: An end-user perspective. Human technology, 16(2), 170-199. https://doi.org/10.17011/ht/urn.202008245641
CR  - Martini, M., Drews, C., Seeliger, P. & Weinzierl, Q. (2021). Dark patterns: Phänomenologie und antworten der rechtsordnung. Zeitschrift für digitalisierung und recht, 1(1), 47-74. https://www.uni-speyer.de/fileadmin/Lehrstuehle/Martini/2021_Dark_patterns__zfdr_mit_Weinzierl_Seeliger_Drews_S_74ff.pdf
CR  - Mathur, A., Acar, G., Friedman, M. J., Lucherini, E., Mayer, J., Chetty, M. & Narayanan, A. (2019). Dark patterns at scale: Findings from a crawl of 11K shopping websites. Proceedings of the ACM on human-computer interaction, 81, 1-32. https://doi.org/10.1145/3359183
CR  - Mathur, A., Mayer, J., & Kshirsagar, M. (2021). What makes a dark pattern... dark?: Design attributes, normative considerations, and measurement methods. CHI conference on human factors in computing systems, 360, 1-18. https://doi.org/10.1145/3411764.3445610
CR  - Nimwegen, C., Bergman, K. & Akdag, A. (2022). Shedding light on assessing dark patterns:Introducing the system darkness scale (SDS). 35th international BCS human-computer interaction conference. https://doi.org/10.14236/ewic/HCI2022.7
CR  - Nousiainen, K. & Ortega, C. P. (2023). Dark patterns in law and economics framework. Loyola consumer law review, 36(1), 90-112. https://lawecommons.luc.edu/lclr/vol36/iss1/4
CR  - Peschke, L. & Güneş Peschke, S. (2022). Artificial intelligence and the new challenges for EU legislation. Yıldırım Beyazıt law review, 2, 1267-1297. https://doi.org/10.33432/ybuhukuk.1104344
CR  - Rieger, S. & Sinders, C. (2020). Dark patterns: Regulating digital design. Stiftung Neue Verantwortung. https://www.interface-eu.org/storage/archive/files/dark.patterns.english.pdf
CR  - Sin, R., Harris, T., Nilsson, S. & Beck, T. (2022). Dark patterns in online shopping: Do they work and can nudges help mitigate impulse buying?. Behavioural public policy, 9(1), 61-87. https://doi.org/10.1017/bpp.2022.11
CR  - Yılmaz, S. & Erkan, V. U. (2020). Sosyal medya hesaplarının miras yoluyla intikal edip edemeyeceği sorusunun kişisel verileri koruma hukuku kapsamında incelenmesi. İnönü Üniversitesi Hukuk Fakültesi, 11(2), 567-586. https://doi.org/10.21492/inuhfd.789817
CR  - Waldman, A. E. (2020). Cognitive biases, dark patterns, and the ‘privacy paradox’. Current opinion in psychology, 31, 105-109. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2019.08.025
UR  - https://dergipark.org.tr/en/pub/imdergi/issue//1709216
L1  - https://dergipark.org.tr/en/download/article-file/4914776
ER  -