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Re: Relationship Between Accessibility, Screen Readers and Security Clarified

for

From: Pollard, Larry W. (DRS)
Date: Jan 26, 2011 11:48AM

Good Afternoon

The statement from named Anna Shubina, Ph.D. at the Department

of Computer Science at Dartmouth College is very true in a lot of ways
and this is something that all E-learning course designers ,web
developers' should remember when designing E-learning course content or
a web developer is building a new web site. With 75%1 of the US
population and 65%2 of the UK population having internet access at home,
it is imperative that websites are designed to be both accessible and
usable. The WCAG Guidelines, introduced in 1999, go some way to helping
web developers create accessible websites-but ...we must look further
than the guidelines if we are to create websites which are accessible to
users with disabilities and the assistive technologies they rely on. The
ADA and Section 508 were enacted by the US federal government to
eliminate barriers in information technology-including eLearning. The
intent is to make new opportunities available for people with
disabilities, and to encourage new technologies that help achieve these
goals. The Canadian AODA and the UK's DDA share this goal.









Larry. Pollard

Accessibility Webmaster

Department of Rehabilitative Services



-----Original Message-----
From: <EMAIL REMOVED>
[mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Terrill
Bennett
Sent: Wednesday, January 26, 2011 11:49 AM
To: WebAIM Discussion List
Subject: [WebAIM] Relationship Between Accessibility, Screen Readers and
Security Clarified



For your enlightenment:



"Lack of accessibility usually indicates that there are potential

security problems. If a screen reader can't extract text out of a

file, then it's an indicator that there's a lot in that format and

there's a lot of stuff in that file that could do bad things to your
computer."



That statement came from a post-doctorate associate at the Department

of Computer Science at Dartmouth College named Anna Shubina, Ph.D.

You can read her remark in a story concerning online access at

Dartmoth University, here:



http://thedartmouth.com/2011/01/26/news/online



Don't shoot me, I'm just the messenger.



Enjoy!



-- terrill --