Rushed by Discomfort, Trapped by Immersion: Users' Experiences and Responses to Privacy Deceptive Design in Commercial VR Applications
For VR researchers, designers, and policymakers, this work highlights unique privacy risks in VR due to multimodal immersion and ergonomic factors, urging ethical design solutions.
A survey of 481 VR users found that deceptive design in commercial VR exploits both cognitive vulnerabilities and bodily strain (termed Ergonomic Susceptibility), and that immersive experiences make users more likely to accept invasive data disclosure. The study identifies ergonomics as a critical factor for privacy-preserving VR design.
Commercial Virtual Reality (VR) transforms people's virtual experiences but introduces deceptive design opportunities that threaten user privacy. Although privacy deceptive patterns on 2D platforms are well-documented, their impacts in VR remain understudied. We surveyed 481 users' experiences and responses to privacy deceptive patterns across eight commercial VR scenarios. We found that VR deceptive design can exploit both cognitive vulnerabilities and bodily strain, a phenomenon we define as Ergonomic Susceptibility, and that VR's sensory-rich experiences can make users more likely to accept invasive data disclosure framed as immersion-preserving. Users recognized manipulation but their prior non-VR exposure can foster privacy resignation. Our study shows ergonomics is a critical factor in future privacy-preserving VR design, and urges VR researchers, designers, and policymakers to develop ethical design and privacy management solutions that account for VR's unique multimodal, immersive, and ergonomic properties, building immersive experiences that respect user privacy and mitigate manipulative data practices.