Onboarding users using prefilled data without creeping them out.
Prefill is a new beast in digital spaces. One that users are still getting used to.
In today’s digital climate, users often feel like their information is at risk. Because it is. 422 million individuals have been affected by information being leaked by online as off 2022 (1). So it’s not surprising users react poorly to their most sensitive infomraiton being filled in for them on a common website.
Ask permission, not forgiveness
Put control in the users hands (a powerful heuristic principle) and be transparent about what’s about to happen. Tell users you are about to pull their information to save them time, but give them a chance to opt out before doing it.
Don’t rub it in their face
Users know their information is out there. They know that companies, and possibly worse entities, are able to find every detail about them. It feels better to users to raise interaction cost and ASK the user to provide sensitive information (such as SSN) than it is convenient to shove their most private info in their face.