TOP 5 COMMON ADA WEB ACCESSIBILITY VIOLATIONS

Web Design | Dec 06, 2024

What is ADA?

Web accessibility gauges a person’s capacity to use a website, especially those with disabilities such as visual or mobility challenges, and hearing impairments. ADA Web Accessibility evaluates a website’s adherence to Americans with Disabilities Act standards, treating it as a public space. Ensuring your website’s accessibility isn’t just a legal requirement; it’s a strategic choice that can enhance your business’s reputation through genuine web inclusivity and accessibility.

TOP 5 Common ADA Web Accessibility Violations

Lack of Contrast / Color Contrast: As most visually impaired people are not completely blind, having the proper level of contrast on a website makes viewing website content easier. Colorblindness is also commonly overlooked and easily accommodated by avoiding certain color combinations.
Wrong Font Size: Font is just as important as the color and contrast choices when it comes to readability. Something as simple as choosing the proper font and size could help people read web content a lot easier.
Keyboard Navigation: Many users with disabilities rely on keyboard navigation, making mouse and trackpad use challenging. Integrating keyboard shortcuts, like “tab” for jumping between links and “return” for selection, significantly boosts accessibility.
Text Embedded as Images without Proper Descriptive Tagging: Many users with visual impairments rely on various hardware and software that “read” content on a website out loud for them. Commonly referred to as “readers.” When websites have text saved as an image, the readers cannot decipher and “read” what the image says.
Missing Close Captions on Videos: Videos on websites must have ADA-required closed captions, vital for those with hearing impairments. Closed captions go beyond regular captions, including actions and sounds for a comprehensive understanding.

Who is Impacted?

People with disabilities are the most impacted when it comes to ADA Web Accessibility. Over 16% of our world population has a disability. Not having equal access to the internet is an educational, social, and economic disadvantage for a big part of our population.

Any person or organization who owns and operates a website in the United States that is open to the public is impacted by regulations set forth by the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Title I and III of the ADA are used regularly in the enforcement of web accessibility.
Title I: Title I of the ADA covers any business with at least 15 full-time employees operating for 20 or more weeks yearly.
Title III: Under Title III, businesses that fall into the “public accommodation” category, such as hotels, banks and public transportation, must also comply. The entirety of the law applies, from physical considerations to digital accommodations.

Why is it Important?

Improved user experience: When you prioritize access needs, you ensure visitors with a disability are given as pleasant an experience on your site as those without a disability.

Search engine optimization (SEO) advantages: Many ADA-compliance features hinge on making your site accessible to screen readers. Consequently, these changes also make your site accessible to search engines, which crawl your site to determine your organic search rankings.

Legal compliance: Failure to abide by ADA and Section 508 standards can lead to heavy lawsuits and fines for your company that could be easily avoided by incorporating accessibility standards.

History of ADA Web Accessibility

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), signed into law on July 26, 1990, aimed to ensure equal access to public spaces for all Americans, including the 1-in-4 with disabilities.

As the internet became a larger part of daily life, ADA Web Accessibility emerged when WCAG 1.0 was published on May 5, 1999, by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Although WCAG serves as the de facto standard for ADA Web Accessibility, it’s not yet officially recognized as a legal standard, but ongoing government efforts seek to change this.

Solutions

Here are two schools of thought when it comes to ADA Website Compliance:

Overlay Solutions
‘Scan and Fix’

Overlay Solutions (Not Recommended):

Overlay solutions are software solutions that are installed as a layer between a website and visitors to grab content from the original (usually non-compliant) website and “translate” the content into an accessible version. These solutions are typically designed to get a passing score from ADA scanners, while offering a mediocre experience for users with accessibility needs.

The reason these solutions are popular is because they typically charge a low monthly fee that website owners can “set and forget.” While some of these overlay solutions do offer tools for website owners to modify parts of the user experience, many will not touch it once the software.

While overlay solutions give many companies the illusion of compliance, they are not only offering customers with disabilities a bad experience – they are putting themselves at risk for lawsuits. A quick Google search on “ADA overlay solution lawsuits” will reveal a lot of reasons why this is not a good solution.

One of the biggest publications in the digital marketing industry has a good article on this topic:

Are you using an accessibility overlay to help disabled users? Don’t!