The Dark Side of Augmented Reality: Exploring Manipulative Designs in AR

Abstract

Augmented Reality (AR) applications are becoming more mainstream, with successful examples in the mobile environment like Pokemon GO. Current malicious techniques can exploit these environments’ immersive and mixed nature (physical-virtual) to trick users into providing more personal information, i.e., dark patterns. Dark patterns are deceiving techniques (e.g., interface tricks) designed to influence individuals’ behavioural decisions. However, there are few studies regarding dark patterns’ potential issues in AR environments. In this work, using scenario construction to build our prototypes, we investigate the potential future approaches that dark patterns can have. We use VR mockups in our user study to analyze the effects of dark patterns in AR. Our study indicates that dark patterns are effective in immersive scenarios, and the use of novel techniques, such as “haptic grabbing” to draw participants’ attention, can influence their movements. Finally, we discuss the impact of such malicious techniques and what techniques can mitigate them.

Keywords:

• Dark patterns
• augmented reality

Notes

1 https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/hololens

2 https://www.magicleap.com/en-us/

3 https://www.meta.com/quest/products/quest-2/

4 https://www.picoxr.com/global/products/pico4

5 https://developers.google.com/ar/design

6 https://developer.apple.com/design/human-interface-guidelines/ios/system-capabilities/augmented-reality/

7 https://unity.com/

8 https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/tools/integration/steamvr-plugin-32647

9 https://about.fb.com/news/2021/10/facebook-company-is-now-meta/

10 https://openai.com/blog/chatgpt

Additional information

Funding

This research was partially supported by the MetaUST project from HKUST(GZ) and the FIT project [Grant No. 325570] from the Academy of Finland.

Notes on contributors

Xian Wang

Xian Wang received BSc in Electronic Science and Technology from Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University in 2021. She is currently conducting her PhD in Artificial Intelligence at SyMLab, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Her research interests include human-computer interaction, haptic feedback, virtual reality, and games.

Lik-Hang Lee

Lik-Hang Lee received the PhD degree from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, and the BEng (Hons) and MPhil degrees from the University of Hong Kong. Currently, he is an assistant professor at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. His research interests include human-centric computing systems, AR and VR.

Carlos Bermejo Fernandez

Carlos Bermejo Fernandez received his PhD from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST). His research interests include human-computer interaction, privacy, and augmented reality. He is currently a postdoc researcher at the SyMLab in the Department of Computer Science at HKUST.

Pan Hui

Pan Hui received PhD from the University of Cambridge. He is a Chair Professor and Director of the Centre for Metaverse and Computational Creativity at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou). Additionally, he holds the Nokia Chair in Data Science at the University of Helsinki.