[trustable-software] Dark Patterns for unethical user interfaces

Paul Sherwood paul.sherwood at codethink.co.uk
Sun Jul 31 08:34:23 UTC 2016


Hi all,
I came across darkpatterns.org from an article in Ars Technica today 
[1], and immediately recognised that there may be some interest for 
readers here.

Although I've noticed some of the user-interface scams that are 
mentioned there, it hadn't occurred to me that there are so many big 
name companies dedicating huge amounts of deliberate *effort* into 
tricking people in such systematic ways.

Harry Brignull's call in his presentation [2] for a code of ethics and 
public shaming immediately made me think of the automotive situation, 
where emissions-cheating software was passed of as “this was a couple of 
software engineers who put this in for whatever reason.” I don't think 
anyone really believes that was true, and I'm sure there are many 
situations where engineers are being pressured to do the wrong thing.

I think we should start thinking about how best to establish a solid 
code of ethics for software engineering here. Any ideas on how to start 
that?

br
Paul

[1] 
http://arstechnica.co.uk/security/2016/07/dark-patterns-what-are-they/
[2] https://youtu.be/1KVyFio8gw4




More information about the trustable-software mailing list