I first wrote about overlays in February 2021 in a post titled "The Problem with Overlays." The post is pretty simple. It defines overlays, gives examples of how they function, and explains why they are not an acceptable solution for your accessibility work.
Almost a year later, on July 27, 2022, I revisited overlays, as they had been called out in an article by Amanda Morris. Her article was an interview with a young man, Patrick Perdue, who is blind and shopped for radio equipment on Ham Radio Outlet's website.
To summarize Ms Morris' article, when Mr. Perdue first began using the website, it was coded in a way that made it easy for him to find, read about, and purchase the items he needed. Then, Ham Radio Outlet decided to install an overlay from accessiBe.
Ironically, the accessiBe overlay, meant to resolve coding issues, rendered the website unusable for Mr. Perdue. Rather than fixing any accessibility errors, it reformatted the page in a way that hid vital widgets, including the checkout and shopping cart buttons, from his screen reader. Incorrect coding of image and button labels, along with the disappearance of the search box and section headers, left Mr. Perdue unable to navigate the site.
Fast forward to April 22, 2025. The headline reads: FTC Approves Final Order Requiring accessiBe to pay $1 Million.
The FTC’s January 2025 proposed complaint alleged that, despite the company’s claims, accessWidget did not make all user websites WCAG-compliant, and these claims were false, misleading, or unsubstantiated. In addition, the complaint alleged that accessiBe deceptively formatted third-party articles and reviews to appear as if they were independent opinions and failed to disclose the company’s material connections to the supposedly objective reviewers.
When I read that, I returned to the article by Amanda Morris. I then took a peek at Ham Radio Outlet's website to see if anything had changed. And there it was. The overlay icon. It seems the only update at Ham Radio Outlet is their payment to a different company for the same inaccessible website. <sigh>
Resources
- Overlay Timeline
- The Problem with Overlays
- Overlays: A Year and a Half Later
- FTC Approves Final Order Requiring AccessiBe to pay $1 Million
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