Rethinking Interface Design in the Digital Society: Dark Patterns and Governance Strategies

With the widespread application of digital platforms, interface design has evolved from mere information presentation into a crucial tool for shaping user behavior. As a design strategy that covertly manipulates user choices through visual, linguistic, and interactional pathways, dark patterns have been extensively embedded in sectors such as e-commerce, finance, education, healthcare, and social networking. Supported by big data analytics, algorithmic prediction, and behavioral modeling, dark patterns exploit users’ cognitive limitations and psychological biases to construct decision-making environments that appear free but are in fact controlled. This design practice has led to a series of social problems, including the infringement of user interests, cognitive manipulation, and privacy leakage.