As a totally blind person, I’m so glad the FTC has taken action against AccessiBe. Overlays, like AccessiBe, cause those of us who use assistive technologies to use the web more problems than they solve. There are two primary reasons why AccessiBe causes those of us who use assistive technologies more problems than they solve: they give website owners a false sense of compliance; and they are frustrating for those of us who use assistive technologies to use.
Thanks to the deceptive marketing practices of AccessiBe, businesses and government agencies have been convinced to believe that installing AccessiBe’s overlay will actually make all of their site and related sites accessible. As the settlement demonstrates, the vast amount of third-party content necessary to effectively use the services offered by most businesses and government agencies will not be affected by AccessiBe’s technology unless the third-parties use the tool as well. For this reason, I’m very much looking forward to sharing the final settlement with my water company. It’s third-party portal is not accessible, even though the water company has put AccessiBe’s tool on its primary website.
AccessiBe and all of the other overlays promising WCAG compliance are frustrating to use for those of us who use assistive technologies because they change the way we typically navigate web content. Depending on the overlay being used, we have to memorize different keystrokes. In some cases, we need to activate a menu and choose different options. Both of these requirements make navigating web content slower and less efficient for those of us who use assistive technologies than web navigation is for those who don’t use assistive technologies. Also, use of overlays, like AccessiBe, will never make web content as accessible and usable as is content coded for accessibility and tested by native users of assistive technologies for usability.
Not addressed by this settlement because it’s beyond the scope of this settlement is the reality that strict compliance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines doesn’t actually ensure web content is fully accessible and/or usable. Even if AccessiBe was able to make all web content compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, it would not be able to promise to make all web content fully accessible to and/or usable by those of us who use assistive technologies.
I thank the FTC for taking this important action on behalf of those of us with disabilities. I’m hopeful this action will help businesses and government agencies understand that there is no substitute for coding web content for accessibility and for having native users of assistive technologies test important content for usability.