Ensuring Fair Digital Practices: FTC vs. Amazon, AI Transparency, and Tackling Digital Slavery

In this edition, we explore pivotal developments shaping the digital landscape, from a landmark FTC ruling against Amazon, to our ongoing series on AI transparency, and uncovering the harsh realities of digital slavery. Dive into the latest efforts to secure fairness, transparency, and accountability in the online world.

🇺🇸 FTC vs. Amazon: A Landmark Ruling Against Dark Patterns

Personal liability and potential jail sentences for executives? The stakes are high. In a groundbreaking decision, a federal judge denied Amazon's motion to dismiss the FTC’s case over Prime, marking a significant victory for the FTC in its fight against dark patterns. 🚀🔍

The lawsuit, initiated by the Federal Trade Commission in 2023, accuses Amazon of using deceptive practices to trick consumers into subscribing to Amazon Prime. These dark patterns included a convoluted, seven-step process to unsubscribe, notoriously called “Iliad” internally. 😈

On May 28th, 2024, the judge issued a 49-page order, rejecting Amazon’s arguments that the dark patterns theory is unconstitutionally vague. This decision reinforces the FTC's authority to hold companies and their executives accountable for deceptive practices. FTC Chair Lina Khan called it an "important programmatic win for the FTC’s work on subscription traps and dark patterns." 👮🏻♀️

This ruling sets a precedent for further enforcement against dark patterns, highlighting the importance of ethical digital practices. The FTC's decision is expected by early 2025, potentially leading to personal liability for three senior Amazon executives.

🛠 Resources:

• The FTC complaint: here
• One of our academic papers: From dark to fair patterns
• Personal liability details: here
• An investor's lawsuit against Amazon: here
• How fair patterns would look on Amazon: here

‍

🤖 AI Transparency: Navigating the Future with Clarity

Ensuring AI systems are transparent, understandable, and verifiable by humans is a monumental challenge we have embraced. AI transparency fosters trust, ensures accountability, and enables informed decision-making.

Key aspects include:

• Data Transparency: Disclosure of data sources and processing.
• Algorithm Transparency: Insights into the AI’s logic and parameters.
• Model Interpretability: Creating human-understandable models.
• Operational Transparency: Information on AI deployment and limitations.
• Accountability and Governance: Clear frameworks and responsible parties.
• Ethical Considerations: Fair, private, and non-discriminatory AI practices.

The upcoming AI Act, set to be published soon, underscores the urgency of these efforts. It includes stringent regulations to ensure AI systems are transparent and accountable, with varying compliance timelines for different risk categories.

Last week, we discussed AI and minors, emphasizing the importance of safe and ethical AI use for younger audiences. Read more about it here. 🌐✨

Transparency in AI is essential for building public trust and promoting ethical AI use. Join us in navigating this complex but crucial terrain.

‍

📉 Uncovering Digital Slavery: The Battle for Autonomy

Digital slavery is a growing concern, but what is it exactly? There are now different ways of referring to slavery. The traditional slavery, “chattel” slavery referring to the owning of a person, is different from “modern slavery,” a term often used today to refer to controlling someone, this can be for example, sex trafficking. But what if there is trafficking of your data? What if corporations are greatly profiting off of what they consider, a raw unowned resource, but that resource is generated by you and your life - no not in terms of your physical body - but in terms of the data associated with you: your travels, your health, your likes, dislikes, your social network,etc. In short, your data is being used to make companies money, while you willingly give your”self” away for free. Sometimes, depending on the lengthy complicated contracts, you’ve given your data over forever.

“So what? I’ll get better ads that way,” you might think.

What many fail to recognize is that there are several serious consequences to simply clicking accept. When companies and governments have your data, AI and surveillance can be used to their advantage, convincing you to pay more, manipulating you into making certain decisions, or simply convincing you into complicity. By offering our data up for grabs, we are unknowingly giving away our agency to some degree. This compromises user autonomy and well-being, and traps individuals in cycles of dependency. There is a form of digital enslavement happening: as we scroll, data is “freely” collected with our attention spans being the generator, and this collected data then informing companies how to get or keep us addicted, thereby generating even more data.

Key issues include:

1. Data Exploitation and Privacy Concerns: Companies collect vast amounts of personal data without explicit consent, monetizing it through targeted advertising.
2. Manipulative Design Techniques: Features like infinite scrolling and algorithmic content curation maximize user engagement, leading to addictive behaviors.
3. Monetization of User Attention: User attention is a valuable commodity, incentivizing more manipulative features.

These practices have severe societal impacts, including mental health issues, erosion of privacy, and widening social inequalities. To combat digital slavery, stronger regulations, digital literacy, and ethical design principles are essential.

Big tech companies, such as GAFAs (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple), often protect their interests by blocking user-friendly initiatives. For instance, Facebook shut down the "Unfollow Everything" tool, which allowed users to unfollow all pages and groups, highlighting the resistance to transparency and user autonomy.

To learn more about digital slavery, visit this link.

By addressing these critical issues, we at Fairpatterns take significant steps towards ensuring fairness, transparency, and accountability in the digital landscape. Let's continue to champion ethical practices and protect the rights of all users in this rapidly evolving digital age. 🌍💡

#fairpatterns #deceptivedesign #impactdriven #solutionmakers #onlinedeception #onlinemanipulation #privacy #privacylaw #darkpatterns

‍

The highlights of this month!

• Our blog post on the Basic Principles of UX and UI Design: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/fairpatterns_what-are-the-basic-principles-of-ux-and-ui-activity-7204361438226739201-m4M1?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
• Our first post of our series on AI Transparency: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/fairpatterns_aitransparency-plainlanguage-ai-activity-7207351155960483840-0aKr?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
• Our take on Big Tech and AI Systems: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/fairpatterns_cnil-ai-aisystems-activity-7208710103468834816-cbbS?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
• Our blog post on Ethical Design Principles: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/fairpatterns_ethical-design-x-principles-and-how-to-apply-activity-7208861028023943168-gMc1?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

Discover how we can support you!

Want to know more?

You can find all of our news updated on our site www.fairpatterns.com and listen our podcast with some amazing voices helping framing #darkpatterns through different lenses.

Become a client!

‍