More than 500,000 Fortnite players are in line to receive a cash payment from Epic Games after the Federal Trade Commission ruled that the game maker tricked customers into making unwanted purchases.
The $245 million settlement, first announced two years ago, accused the publisher of using tactics called “dark patterns,” or deceptive interface designs, to trick people into making purchases, to let children rack up charges without parental knowledge or involvement, and even blocked user accounts who disputed these unauthorized charges.
Also: Is this the end of Google? This new AI tool isn’t just competing, it’s winning
The FTC says Epic Games made counterintuitive, inconsistent, and confusing button configurations related to making purchases. For example, players could accidentally make a purchase while attempting to wake the game from sleep mode or while the game was in a loading screen by pressing a single button or by pressing an adjacent button while …