Digital Accessibility: What Really Matteres
Digital accessibility is an important topic that is gaining more and more significance. As more and more people use the internet, it is crucial that all individuals, regardless of their abilities and limitations, can access the internet.
The Digital Accessibility Strengthening Act (shortened as BFSG) for the first time obligates private economic actors to enhance digital accessibility. The aim is to enable individuals with different disabilities to participate digitally. Therefore, companies and even associations must make their apps, online shops, and websites accessible by the deadline of June 28, 2025, if they fall under the BFSG.
What does this mean for companies?
The BFSG demands, for example, that an online shop should be findable, accessible, and usable for people with disabilities without specific difficulties—fundamentally without external assistance. To achieve this, the offerings of an online shop must be provided through more than one sensory channel. Simply displaying products and services that can be purchased as text and images is no longer sufficient. Instead, the content must also be audible through speech output, making it perceptible aurally.
Digital accessibility can often be implemented in communication with existing means, thanks to AI support:
- Converting text to speech: for instance, through the automatic creation of audio files or the use of a read-aloud function
- Converting speech to text: using live subtitles in meetings, closed captioning, or subtitling of videos to even utilizing a sign language avatar
- Alternate cursor control methods: using voice input or eye tracking
- Rephrasing text into simple language: through generative AI
By enhancing digital accessibility, you not only enable individuals with disabilities to lead more self-determined lives, but you also simultaneously strengthen your competitiveness. The question arises whether you want to continue excluding the important target group of individuals with permanent, temporary, or situational disabilities – as potential customers, employees, partners, or investors.
Here are some tips on how you can make your website more accessible:
- Use simple and clear language.
- Avoid long and complicated sentences.
- Use headings and subheadings to structure the content of your website.
- Use images and graphics sparingly and meaningfully.
- Add a speech output feature so that people with visual impairments can use your website.
- Include a way to navigate your website with the keyboard.
- Ensure that your website works well on all devices and browsers.
By making your website more accessible, you not only reach individuals with disabilities but also all other users who can benefit from using your website more easily and efficiently.