There’s an informative post over on the Mozilla Explains blog, about deceptive design patterns. From the article:

Deceptive design patterns are tricks used by websites and apps to get you to do things you might not otherwise do, like buy things, sign up for services or switch your settings.

The post goes on to list some common examples. I’m sure you’ll recognize at least some of these.

Unfortunately, this kind of deception is not limited to the online world, and most of us don’t even raise an eyebrow when we encounter shady sales practices in the ‘real’ world. But the online world is already much more confusing for many people, so recognizing deception can be difficult.

It’s an interesting read, and it may help you to understand some of what you see online, and on your connected devices.