Check your website for deceptive design practices that could trigger FTC enforcement. Scan any URL below for free, with no signup required.
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In 2022, the FTC published a report that put companies across every industry on notice that deceptive design practices would face enforcement action. Since then, the agency has followed through with some of the largest fines in its history.
Epic Games paid $245 million in 2022 over deceptive button placement in the Fortnite item shop that led to unwanted purchases, particularly by children. Amazon was fined $25 million in 2023 for making it extremely difficult to cancel Alexa subscriptions and for retaining children's voice data. ABCmouse settled for $10 million in 2020 after the FTC found the company used hidden auto-renewal terms and made cancellation nearly impossible.
These are not isolated cases. The FTC is actively investigating companies of all sizes for dark pattern violations, and state attorneys general are following the same playbook. If your website uses checkout flows, subscription signups, or cancellation processes, you should know whether those interfaces cross the line into deceptive design.
Our dark pattern scanner checks your website for 10 categories of deceptive design that the FTC has specifically targeted in enforcement actions. These include pre-checked subscription boxes that add unwanted charges, cancellation flows that are deliberately harder than the signup process, confirm-shaming language designed to guilt users into staying, and hidden fees that only appear at the final checkout step.
The scanner also flags deceptive button styling that makes the preferred action less prominent, fake urgency indicators like countdown timers that reset, roach motel patterns where signing up is easy but leaving is almost impossible, forced continuity charges after free trials, trick questions that use double negatives to confuse users, and visual misdirection that draws attention away from important options.
This scanner is built for e-commerce stores, SaaS companies, and subscription businesses that need to verify their checkout and signup flows are not crossing into deceptive territory. If your website collects payments, manages subscriptions, or handles cancellations, you should be scanning regularly.
Marketing teams and UX designers also use our scanner to audit landing pages and conversion flows before they go live. Catching a dark pattern during development is far cheaper than dealing with an FTC investigation after launch.
For a deeper look at how dark patterns work and the fines companies have faced, see our dark pattern examples and fines page. For a step-by-step compliance guide, visit the FTC compliance checklist. Our full Dark Pattern Scanner page has additional details, and you can compare plans on our pricing page.