A checkout can be fast without being fair. A subscription can be easy to start and deliberately difficult to stop. And a game can show a price in coins while making the real-money cost harder to understand.
These are product-design decisions, not just problems buried in terms and conditions. That is what makes Europe’s latest consumer-protection proposal relevant to Indian founders, product teams and shoppers.
On 11 November, the European Commission proposed a Digital Fairness Act covering manipulative online selling, spending incentives, pricing and digital contracts. It is a proposal, not an enacted European ban. India, meanwhile, already has dark-pattern guidelines in force.
The Breakdown
Europe is proposing a wider rulebook, not starting from zero
The EU already regulates unfair commercial practices. The proposed Act would replace the existing Unfair Commercial Practices Directive with a regulation and add more explicit provisions for digital commerce. It still needs to pass through the EU legislative process; businesses should not treat the draft as a final compliance deadline.
Among the proposed changes are clearer disclosures for influencer advertising, more transparent prices in virtual queues and easier management of digital contracts. The Commission also wants consumers to have greater control over features designed to encourage excessive use.
The gaming provisions illustrate how far this extends beyond a misleading checkout button. The draft would require disclosure of the real-money value of purchases made with paid-for virtual currencies. Paid random-reward systems, such as loot boxes, would face probability disclosures and tools to disable them. The proposal would prohibit offering those systems to minors where a product targets them or the trader knows with reasonable certainty that they use it. Some overlapping services would instead fall under corresponding provisions of the separately proposed EU KIDS framework.
That is not a blanket ban on all games, all virtual rewards or every purchase by someone under 18.
India’s starting point is different
India’s Central Consumer Protection Authority issued its dark-pattern guidelines in November 2023. They apply to platforms systematically offering goods or services in India, advertisers and sellers.
The guidelines identify 13 practices, including false urgency, basket sneaking, subscription traps and interface interference. In plain language: inventing scarcity, adding paid extras without consent, obstructing cancellation or designing a screen to steer people away from the choice they intended.
A June 2025 advisory subsequently asked e-commerce platforms to audit themselves within three months and remove dark patterns. That was an earlier compliance exercise, not a new deadline starting with Europe’s announcement.
The two frameworks are not interchangeable. India’s existing guidelines do not automatically acquire every proposed European restriction, and a European proposal does not suspend Indian obligations.
Why This Matters
For an Indian consumer business, the useful question is not simply whether a lawyer has approved the wording. It is whether the customer journey preserves an informed choice.
Consider three hypothetical design reviews:
A shopping basket: Can the customer distinguish the item price, necessary charges and genuinely optional extras before agreeing to pay? A higher final bill is not by itself evidence of a dark pattern; consent and disclosure matter.
A subscription: Can someone find the cancellation route and understand what happens next, without being bounced between contradictory screens?
A game: Can a player understand the money behind a token balance, rather than having to reconstruct several currency conversions?
These are illustrative tests, not findings against particular companies or substitutes for a legal assessment.
There is also a measurement problem. A design experiment may increase completed purchases while leaving more people confused about what they bought. Product teams should therefore examine complaints, refund requests and cancellation difficulty alongside conversion rates. A sale and an informed purchase are not necessarily the same outcome.
The Big Picture
Indian businesses serving European consumers should track the proposal’s final scope and implementation timetable. Companies selling only in India have a more immediate task: review their existing journeys against Indian rules rather than waiting for a foreign law to arrive.
The Crunch
Europe’s proposal is a fresh policy development. India’s dark-pattern rules are an existing operating requirement. For businesses, the practical lesson is to test not only how easily customers say yes, but how clearly they can understand the price, decline an extra and leave.
Related categories: Technology & AI
Leave your thoughts