National Geographic was reported to the Deceptive Design Tip Line over a pop-up shown to readers without a subscription. According to the report, reading an online article requires submitting an email address through the pop-up, but in doing so the user is also signed up for marketing from National Geographic and its parent company Disney, as well as agreeing to the terms of service and privacy policy. The reporter said there was no separate mechanism for simply reading the article or for agreeing to those terms alone.
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National Geographic: Requires email to read articles, signing up for spam
“To read an online article without a subscription, a pop-up requires you to submit an email address. But the user is also signing up for spam from National Geographic AND its parent, Disney, as well as agreeing to the terms of service and privacy policy. There is no separate mechanism for just reading the article or agreeing to those terms.”