Section 508 requires all US Federal agencies to make the ICT (technology, website, online training, etc.) they create, maintain and manage accessible and usable by persons with disabilities, as it is accessible by employees without disabilities. The US access board established it and implemented the law providing the accessibility requirements.
Section 508 holds great importance as it made ICT accessible to people with disabilities, regardless of whether they are federal employees or not. Here’s our detailed explanation of everything you need to know about Section 508 to provide you with useful insights into it and make you understand its importance.
Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act is a law that requires Federal agencies to make any ICT developed, gathered, maintained, or used by them accessible to people with disabilities, including employees and the public. Version 2.0 of the Web Content Accessibility Standards (WCAG) comes under Section 508 and establishes requirements for designers and developers.
In compliance with this Section, all federal departments try to make their websites accessible to people with visual, hearing, motor and cognitive disabilities. The accessibility of their content is a constant work in which the agencies seek solutions to improve their sites by providing regular training to the employees who create their documents, write their content and build the functionality of their websites.
As reflected in its objectives, Section 508 does not only deal with the accessibility of Web pages and applications. It also deals with the Software and, therefore, with authoring tools and browsers.
On the W3C website (World Wide Web Consortium), you can find a comparative study of the Section 508 standards and the requirements and priorities of the “User-Agent Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 (UAAG)”, which will be of interest to all developers.
Although it is debated whether Section 508 applies to state governments, there are several instances where the law applies, and states must comply. For example, many states have enacted their own “mini 508” laws tweaking the requirements.
Although Section 508 enforcement is an explicit statutory obligation for federal agencies on all information they maintain, the emphasis is on newly acquired ICT. Awards procured after June 25, 2001, are subject to Section 508 since this category is enforceable by legal action.
It was originally introduced as an amendment to the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 in 1986 to deal with electronics and information technology, considering the domain’s growth. But the original Section 508 had proven ineffective, mainly due to the shortcomings in the enforcement mechanisms. In 1997, the Federal Electronic and Information Technology Accessibility and Compliance Act was proposed to correct those shortcomings and the revised Act was enacted in 1998 as the new Section 508.
In 2017, Section 508 Refresh came into effect, later updated in 2018 to reinstate access provisions and essentially align Web elements with the W3C’s WCAG 2.0 AA criteria.
The technical standards include accessible alternatives with:
The law also requires that web content be made accessible, and by January 18, 2018, organizations must also meet WCAG 2.0 Level A and Level AA success criteria.
For closed captioning, Section 508 only requires that Federal communications be accessible. However, due to each state’s assistive technology law and accessibility policies, state governments may need to comply with Section 508, which means they should provide reasonable accommodations to people with disabilities throughout their communication efforts, including online video.
Some disabilities may hinder navigation and access to digital information, including visual, hearing, motor and cognitive impairment. Section 508 requires government agencies to develop means to respect web accessibility to all individuals with disabilities. They have different ways and techniques to make their website content accessible and meet Section 508 requirements. Some of the techniques include:
Article 508 applies to:
The law requires that an alternative and accessible technological method be provided to employees with disabilities and public members.
Section 508 exempts private websites from complying unless they receive federal funds or they are in contract with a federal agency. It also applies exemptions to the agencies where Section 508 requirements would result in an undue hardship. However, they are still required to provide an alternative method to make information accessible to all.
Federal agencies take the following steps to ensure the accessibility of their ICT:
We hope the information above has left you with some useful insights into the importance of Section 508, and how it has changed the way digital content is created and used today. It may seem to be a complex legislation piece, but it is one of the most visible online accessibility regulations in the US.
