We have some exciting news! The U.S. Access Board announced that they will approve the long anticipated ”508 Refresh” of the Standards and Guidelines for Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in Section 508 of the Rehabilitations Act “around October 2016”. The Access Board’s proposed refresh will update the existing Electronic and Information Technology Accessibility Standards under Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, as well as the Telecommunications Act Accessibility Guidelines under Section 255 of the Communications Act. As technology has dramatically changed, the existing Section 508 technical provisions are grossly out of date. The Access Board feels that it is past time to update accessibility requirements to reflect modern technology. The ICT Refresh will cover a wide scope of the Web Accessibility Initiative’s Web Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0, an international standard for web accessibility. As federal courts have already begun to enforce WCAG 2.0 standards, the California State Government for some time has highly recommended that state agencies begin to adhere to WCAG 2.0 AA Guidelines and Success Criteria to avoid legal ramifications, not only for websites but also for web applications, software, and documents. The new requirements will increase accessibility and empower audiences to create fully accessible websites and documents for the enjoyment of all. We should all take this opportunity to become familiar with WCAG 2.0. For more information, visit https://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/wcag.
