Consent And Agency

---
name: consent-and-agency
description: Designing for informed user consent, opt-out, and human override.
---
# Consent and Agency
AI products make decisions, take actions, and process information on behalf of users. Consent and agency design ensures users remain in control — understanding what the AI does, agreeing to it, and being able to override it.
## Informed Consent for AI
Users should understand and agree to:
- **What data the AI uses**: Conversation history, personal data, uploaded documents, browsing behaviour
- **What the AI does with it**: Training, personalisation, sharing with third parties, storage
- **What actions the AI takes**: Sending messages, making changes, accessing systems
- **What the AI can't do**: Limitations that might affect the user's expectations
Consent is not a checkbox at sign-up. It's an ongoing design challenge throughout the experience.
## Designing for Agency
Agency means the user feels — and is — in control:
- **Opt-in over opt-out**: AI features should be activated by the user, not imposed
- **Reversibility**: AI actions should be undoable wherever possible
- **Override mechanisms**: The user can always stop, redirect, or override the AI
- **Exit paths**: The user can disengage from AI assistance at any point without penalty
- **Preference controls**: The user can adjust AI behaviour, scope, and autonomy levels
## Consent Patterns
- **Progressive consent**: Ask for permission incrementally as new capabilities are needed, not all at once
- **Contextual consent**: Ask at the moment the action is about to happen, not in advance
- **Granular consent**: Let users consent to specific actions or data uses, not blanket permissions
- **Revocable consent**: Users can withdraw consent and have that withdrawal take effect
## Agency Anti-Patterns
- **Dark patterns**: Making it hard to opt out or override the AI
- **Consent fatigue**: Asking for permission so often that users click through without reading
- **Learned helplessness**: AI does so much that users forget how to do things themselves
- **Invisible actions**: The AI takes actions the user doesn't know about
- **Irreversible defaults**: AI actions that can't be undone without user awareness
## Design Artefacts
- Consent flow diagrams per feature
- Agency checkpoint specifications
- Override mechanism inventory
- Data use transparency matrix
- Opt-out path designs