Holding Purveyors of “Dark Patterns” for Online Travel Bookings Accountable

Last week, my former colleagues at the New York Attorney General’s Office (NYAG), scored a $2.6 million settlement with Fareportal – a large online travel agency that used deceptive practices, known as “dark patterns,” to manipulate consumers to book online travel.

The investigation exposes how Fareportal, which operates under several brands, including CheapOair and OneTravel — used a series of deceptive design tricks to pressure consumers to buy tickets for flights, hotels, and other travel purchases. In this post, I share the details of the investigation’s findings and use them to highlight why we need further regulatory intervention to prevent similar conduct from becoming entrenched in other online services.

The NYAG investigation picks up on the work of researchers at Princeton’s CITP that exposed the widespread use of dark patterns on shopping websites. Using the framework we developed in a subsequent paper for defining dark patterns, the investigation reveals how the travel agency weaponized common cognitive biases to take advantage of consumers. The company was charged under the Attorney General’s broad authority to prohibit deceptive acts and practices. In addition to paying $2.6 million, the New York City-based company agreed to reform its practices.

Specifically, the investigation documents how Fareportal exploited the scarcity bias by displaying, next to the top two flight search results, a false and misleading message about the number of tickets left for those flights at the advertised price. It manipulated consumers through adding 1 to the number of tickets the consumer had searched for to show that there were only X+1 tickets left at that price. So, if you searched for one round trip ticket from Philadelphia to Chicago, the site would say “Only 2 tickets left” at that price, while a consumer searching for two such tickets would see a message stating “Only 3 tickets left” at the advertised price. 

In 2019, Fareportal added a design feature that exploited the bandwagon effect by displaying how many other people were looking at the same deal. The site used a computer-generated random number between 28 and 45 to show the number of other people “looking” at the flight. It paired this with a false countdown timer that displayed an arbitrary number that was unrelated to the availability of tickets. 

Similarly, Fareportal exported its misleading tactics to the making of hotel bookings on its mobile apps. The apps misrepresented the percentage of rooms shown that were “reserved” by using a computer-generated number keyed to when the customer was trying to book a room. So, for example, if the check-in date was 16-30 days away, the message would indicate that between 41-70% of the hotel rooms were booked, but if it was less than 7 days away, it showed that 81-99% of the rooms were reserved. But, of course, those percentages were pure fiction. The apps used a similar tactic for displaying the number of people “viewing” hotels in the area. This time, they generated the number based on the nightly rate for the fifth hotel returned in the search by using the difference between the numerical value of the dollar figure and the numerical value of the cents figure. (If the rate was $255.63, consumers were told 192 people were viewing the hotel listings in the area.)

Fareportal used these false scarcity indicators across its websites and mobile platforms for pitching products such as travel protection and seat upgrades, through inaccurately representing how many other consumers that had purchased the product in question. 

In addition, the NYAG charged Fareportal with using a pressure tactic of making consumers accept or decline purchase a travel protection policy to “protect the cost of [their] trip” before completing a purchase. This practice is described in the academic literature as a covert pattern that uses “confirmshaming” and “forced action” to influence choices. 

Finally, the NYAG took issue with how Fareportal manipulated price comparisons to suggest it was offering tickets at a discounted price, when in fact, most of the advertised tickets were never offered for sale at the higher comparison price. The NYAG rejected Fareportal’s attempt to use a small pop-up to cure the false impression conveyed by the visual slash-through image that conveyed the discount. Similarly, the NYAG called out how Fareportal hid its service fees by disguising them as being part of the “Base Price” of the ticket rather than the separate line item for “Taxes and Fees.” These tactics are described in the academic literature as using “misdirection” and “information hiding” to influence consumers. 

The findings from this investigation illustrate why dark patterns are not simply aggressive marketing practices, as some commentators contend, but require regulatory intervention. Specifically, such shady practices are difficult for consumers to spot and to avoid, and, as we argued, risk becoming entrenched across different travel sites who have the incentive to adopt similar practices. As a result, Fareportal, unfortunately, will not be the first or the last online service to deploy such tactics. But this creates an opportunity for researchers, consumer advocates, and design whistleblowers to step forward and spotlight such practices to protect consumers and help create a more trustworthy internet.