Visualization for Villainy

Abstract

Visualization has long been seen as a dependable and trustworthy tool for carrying out analysis and communication tasks-a view reinforced by the growing interest in applying it to socially positive ends. However, despite the benign light in which visualization is usually perceived, it carries the potential to do harm to people, places, concepts, and things. In this paper, we capitalize on this negative potential to serve an underrepresented (but technologically engaged) group: villains. To achieve these ends, we introduce a design space for this type of graphical violence, which allows us to unify prior work on deceptive visualization with novel datadriven dastardly deeds, such as emotional spear phishing and unsafe data physicalization. By charting this vile charting landscape, we open new doors to collaboration with terrifying domain experts, and hopefully, make the world just a bit worse.