Digital Fairness Act Monitor: updates and research explainedSource-verified material updates and plain-language research explainers from the DFA tracker.https://digital-fairness-act.eu/enDigital Fairness Act status: initial verified baselinehttps://digital-fairness-act.eu/updates/initial-status-review/https://digital-fairness-act.eu/updates/initial-status-review/A source-led baseline separating current EU law, the announced Digital Fairness Act initiative, matters under consideration and questions that remain open.Mon, 14 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMTWhy researchers needed an ontology for dark patternshttps://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/dark-pattern-ontology/https://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/dark-pattern-ontology/How the CHI 2024 dark-pattern ontology connects taxonomies and three levels of abstraction, including a documented count discrepancy and limits on legal conclusions.Mon, 14 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMTWhat a crawl of 11,000 shopping sites taught researchers about dark patternshttps://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/dark-patterns-at-scale/https://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/dark-patterns-at-scale/The landmark 2019 web-crawl study explained: how researchers found 1,818 dark-pattern instances, what automation could see and what the crawl could not prove.Mon, 14 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMTThe EDPB’s deceptive-design guide is practical, but narrower than it lookshttps://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/edpb-deceptive-design-guidelines/https://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/edpb-deceptive-design-guidelines/A readable guide to the EDPB’s six deceptive-design categories, social-media lifecycle examples and the boundary between GDPR guidance and a future DFA.Mon, 14 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMTWhy “97% of popular sites” does not mean 97% were unlawfulhttps://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/eu-behavioural-study-dark-patterns/https://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/eu-behavioural-study-dark-patterns/A plain-English guide to the European Commission’s 2022 behavioural study, its striking prevalence finding and the limits of the often-quoted 97% figure.Mon, 14 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMTAI agents can recognise a dark pattern, and still follow ithttps://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/gui-agents-dark-patterns/https://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/gui-agents-dark-patterns/A 2026 CHI study tested people, GUI agents and human-agent teams across 16 dark-pattern types, revealing procedural blind spots and limits to oversight.Mon, 14 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMTSubtle dark patterns can be more dangerous than obvious oneshttps://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/shining-light-experiments/https://digital-fairness-act.eu/research/shining-light-experiments/Two large experiments found that dark patterns changed sign-up behaviour, and that mild designs could steer people without provoking the same backlash as aggressive tactics.Mon, 14 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT