January Digital Accessibility Roundup

Accessibility (a11y) Roundup. Navy blue design of a desktop computer with various accessibility areas, such as Braille display, accessible coding, audio descriptions.

This Month’s Roundup
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Welcome to Disability: IN’s monthly round up of digital accessibility news for December.

At Disability:IN we know that digital accessibility impacts all aspects of disability inclusion. If you have questions about our digital accessibility program, please contact Jeff Wissel, our Chief Accessibility Officer.

Disability:IN Happenings

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Register Now for the 2025 Disability Equality Index

Now trusted by over 70% of the Fortune 100 and nearly half of the Fortune 500, this comprehensive benchmarking tool empowers companies to create data-driven actions that achieve tangible business impact.

Questions? Explore our FAQs or email [email protected] to connect with the team and ask about our Office Hours.

Register Now

Champions for Change: A Global Celebration with Disability:IN

Champions for Change: A Global Celebration with Disability:IN, was created in honor of International Day of Persons with Disabilities. Hosted by speaker, content creator, model, author, and advocate Molly Burke, this dynamic virtua program shares and uplifts the stories of Paralympians from around the world.

The hour-long program is available to stream on-demand now. Companies are encouraged to host their own watch parties using our provided discussion questions, resources, and templates.

Stream Champions for Change Now

Procure Access

Make 2025 the year your company adds Accessibility Requirements into your supplier contracts and signs onto the Procure Access Statement!

The Procure Access Toolkit has all the information you need to establish and enhance your procurement accessibility program. Set 2025 as your target timeline to join Microsoft, Google, JP Morgan, Fidelity Investments, Merck, Lilly, T-Mobile, Verizon, CVS, Salesforce and 28 other leading companies who have signed onto the Procure Access Statement. View the Procure Access Statement Application and prepare to sign-on in 2025!

Spotlight on Disability:IN Partners using technology to enhance the accessibility of products we use every day.

Tim Cook Wants Apple to Literally Save Your Life

Much as the CEO seems awestruck by AI and his just-released Apple Intelligence, he’s more convinced that the tech giant’s health apps will define the company’s legacy.

Walmart’s Free Visual Interpretation Service: A Model Every Supermarket Should Follow

Walmart is setting a new standard in accessibility by offering a free visual interpretation service to blind and low vision customers through its partnership with Aira. This groundbreaking initiative empowers individuals to navigate stores and shop independently, and it serves as a call to action for other supermarkets to follow suit.

Google Brings ‘Emotion To Captions’ With New Expressive Captions Feature

Google is using AI to make captions more contextual and accessible. GOOGLE

Google on Thursday announced an accessibility feature for Android it calls Expressive Captions. The software, which is built atop Google’s existing Live Captions feature, uses artificial intelligence to help Deaf and hard-of-hearing people understand emotion in spoken dialogue.

Google boasts Expressive Captions not only allows users to read what people are saying—“you get a sense of the emotion too,” they said.

Delta is updating the flight map on its seat-back screens to be more accessible to people with disabilities.

A major U.S. airline is making updates to one of its most popular in-flight features in an effort to improve accessibility for people with disabilities.

Delta Air Lines is introducing a new flight map offering high-contrast visuals, a color-blind palette, large text and icons, clearer labels and the ability to zoom and pan.

Contributing to a more accessible and inclusive world | Otis

At Otis Worldwide Corporation, the global leader in elevator and escalator manufacturing and service, one of our goals is to make it easier to navigate urban environments, and we aspire to work so that any new technology can benefit everyone – including people with disabilities.

We do this by making accessibility a critical component of our innovation strategy, listening to input from customers and passengers, including those with disabilities, and ingraining accessibility and inclusion into our corporate culture, in line with our business strategy and product roadmap.

Microsoft Copilot App Arrives On iOS, Bringing Free ChatGPT-4 To iPhone And iPad WindowsLatest.com

Microsoft has recently launched the Copilot app for iOS devices, available for free on the Apple App Store. This app, optimized specifically for iPad, offers an advanced chat interface distinct from Bing’s combination of search, rewards, and chat functionalities. Unlike Bing, Copilot focuses solely on chat capabilities and integrates features like DALL-E 3. In addition to supporting GPT Vision and DALL-E, it includes ChatGPT-4 Turbo for select users, enhancing its responsiveness to recent events, particularly with a disabled search plugin. Copilot enables users to perform a variety of tasks such as writing emails, summarizing texts, language translation, and proofreading, all without cost.

Sony Releases ‘Game Changers’ Short Film About Accessibility In Video Games

Sony on Tuesday posted a video to YouTube which features a retrospective on one year with the Access Controller for PlayStation 5. The nearly 22-minute video, called Game Changers, effectively is a miniature documentary chronicling the experiences of disabled gamers and accessibility advocates Jared Grier and Alejandro Courtney.

Meta’s Ray-Bans Can Now Do Real-Time Live AI And Translation

Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses now feature continuous live AI assistance and real-time translation, using always-on cameras and microphones for extended interactive capabilities. The features, demonstrated earlier this year, allow seamless translations and conversations with a slight delay but impact battery life, lasting only 30 minutes per charge.

Amazon Makes Fire TV More Inclusive with New Accessibility Features

Today, Amazon announced three new accessibility updates designed to make Fire TV and other Amazon products more inclusive for people with disabilities. These updates focus on improving the streaming experience for people with hearing aids, making quick start guides more accessible for visually impaired users, and expanding accessibility features across Amazon devices.

Other Accessibility Highlights for this Month

Ohio Board of Pharmacy launches tool to help those living with disabilities

On Monday, the Ohio Board of Pharmacy launched a tool to help people with low vision, hearing loss, or who face language barriers find pharmacies that can serve them. The new website will help people with accessibility challenges find pharmacies that can serve their specific needs.

For example, patients with low vision can find pharmacies that provide oversized-font labels, prescription readers and braille labels.

It can point those with hearing loss to pharmacies that have video-relay services and teletypewriters. And it can tell non-English speakers where to find pharmacies with translation services for Spanish, Chinese, Nepali, Somali, and other languages.

Lego Increases Disability Inclusion In Its Product Line

Lego is introducing new characters outfitted with an internationally recognized lanyard designed to quietly indicate that a person has a hidden disability and might need some extra support.

The company said this month that it is adding the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower lanyard to characters in a variety of sets. People can also create their own minifigures wearing the special Sunflower symbol at all 55 Minifigure Factories around the world “to give fans additional opportunities to design the character they want to see themselves, a friend or family member represented as.”

Barriers to Accessibility in Public Spaces: Findings from the 2022 Canadian Survey on Disability

This study uses the 2022 Canadian Survey on Disability to explore the experiences of barriers to accessibility in public spaces among persons with disabilities aged 15 years and over. More closely examining the barriers encountered by persons with disabilities as they navigate their environments is important in furthering progress towards an accessible and inclusive Canada.

LG Electronics Expands Accessibility with Six New Comfort Kit Products

LG Electronics has introduced six new products in its “LG Comfort Kit” lineup, enhancing accessibility for individuals with disabilities and senior citizens. The Comfort Kit, first launched in March this year, is a pioneering effort in the appliance industry, designed to make home appliances more user-friendly for people of all abilities and ages.

The latest additions address specific challenges identified through customer feedback and usability studies.

Govia Thameslink Railway Enhances Accessibility with Free Sign Language App

The UK’s largest train operator is offering free use of an innovative sign language app to remove barriers for passengers who are deaf or suffer hearing loss – and help them travel with confidence across its 11-county network.

Customers will be able to use the SignLive app at all 236 of its managed stations, on board trains and with its call centres to communicate with Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR) staff using a trained British Sign Language interpreter on their smartphone screen.

How ALBA Robot’s fully autonomous robotic wheelchair tech is advancing accessibility and inclusivity at airports

We are excited to be launching our ticket scanning capability, which scans your paper boarding pass or QR code and calculates the location of your gate, the time to get there, and because it’s a connected vehicle it also processes any changes in real-time.”

“These new programs offer our passengers, visitors and -customers who are deaf or hard of hearing more independence and real-time assistance across MSP terminals and facilities,” said Phil Burke, assistant director of customer experience for the Metropolitan Airports Commission.

25 Accessibility Tips to Celebrate 25 Years

As WebAIM celebrates our 25th anniversary this month, we’ve shared 25 accessibility tips on our LinkedIn and Twitter/X social media channels. All 25 quick tips are compiled in this article.

Canada ACA Accessibility Action Plan Progress Report, December 31, 2024

The Accessible Canada Act (ACA) established a three-year planning and reporting cycle for federal government departments and agencies. In 2022, Parks Canada published its Accessibility Action Plan, the first year of the three-year plan. As required by the Accessible Canada Regulations. The Procurement Accessibility findings are very insightful.

New technology allows visually-impaired gamers to play first-person shooter games

It uses JBL Quantum’s advanced head tracking and Spatial Audio technology to emulate echolocation – the location of objects reflected by sound, which bats and dolphins use to get to grips with their surroundings – to give gamers heightened awareness of their surroundings.

The tech, called JBL Quantum Guide Play, can be used with any headset, and has been made available for free to help make gaming more inclusive.

Customer experience tools and strategies: 2025 predictions

Customer experience faced serious challenges during the pandemic. Now, there’s no looking back. Customers want it all, and really there’s no excuse for them not to get it. Digital, in-store, mixed “phygital” journeys — they’re all on the table in 2025. The key to customer success will be maintaining a strategy for covering all bases.

U.S. Access Board Presents Preliminary Findings on Artificial Intelligence (AI) for Disability Community and AI Practitioners

As part of the Developing Artificial Intelligence (AI) Equity, Access & Inclusion for All Series, the Access Board will present its preliminary findings on the risks and benefits of AI for people with disabilities. The findings are based on the outcomes of three recent AI hearings held in August 2024, independent research and engagements, as well as comments received from the public.