Complying with DDA Disibility Discrimination Act Using Vbulletin

[MrFlicks]

I did some interesting research recently concerning the DDA Disibility Discrimination Act and Website Accessibility.

I was alarmed to find website owners have already been sued for discrimination against people with disibilities when it comes to accessibility to their website and the servces they provide.

Thus saying say you we're planning to use the Shop mod on a Forum this would therefore mean you we're supplying a service and if it is not available to say someone who is deaf or blind or partially sighted you could it seems actually get sued!

So how does a party go about combating this possibility and would having a mod/addon like the one at the top of this following website be an answer to this?

http://www.equalityhumanrights.com/e...s/default.aspx

I feel like I have come across an aspect of web design that could prove important to consider for anyones online websites especially those actually providing a service as if you could actually get sued for not complying with the DDA directives it could prove disastrous.

Anyone any thoughts on this?

[Paul M]

Are you sure the act applies to private sites.

[Marco van Herwaarden]

The problem is even bigger then only access to modifications or such.

Most boards are using image verification to register. These are designed in such a way that it is impossible/difficult for automated processes to read. Where this works fine to block automated registrations, it will also prevent visual impaired users to register using a screen-reader. Depending under which countrys' law the board s running (not sure about difference between comany/private website) this might lead to trouble if you do not provide an alternative way of registering. At vBulletin.com/.org we solve this by allowing registration for impaired users by submitting a Support Ticket. Although this is not much used.

[MrFlicks]

Originally Posted by Paul M

Are you sure the act applies to private sites.

It suerely gets complicated - for example - lets say a person is visually impaired so much they are blind - if a member only forum or any other website for that matter relied on some imagery to participate normal participation by a blind member would what with present on market options available as far as I know seem to imply exceptions are can and should be at least for now (be) accepted across the board

seems to me some toleration from all sides should be called for but heck that's another subject

[SEOvB]

Target was recently sued for over a million (and lost) a accessibility case.