FCC Approves CVAA Order on Cellphone Browsers; NPRM on User Interface Coming Soon
The FCC required all Web browsers on mobile phones be made accessible for the visually impaired by Oct. 8, said an order Monday on implementing the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act. On circulation is an NPRM on implementing CVAA rules on accessibility requirements for video user interfaces and programming guides, said agency and public-interest officials. An order last month implemented CVAA rules on emergency video description (CD April 10 p6). While some groups representing disabled consumers have said they found the orders and the coming NPRM vague, they also praised the FCC for issuing them. “We've been generally very pleased with the FCC’s efforts to complete these rulemakings in a timely fashion,” said American Council for the Blind Governmental Affairs Director Eric Bridges.
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Monday’s order ruled that Section 718 of the CVAA, which governs Internet browsers on mobile phones, overlaps with Section 716, which the commission implemented in 2011 and requires devices used for advanced communications services (ACS) such as email to be accessible to those with disabilities. CEA had argued because browsers had their own section of the CVAA, they didn’t fall under Section 716, and the FCC didn’t have the authority to regulate them, the order said (http://bit.ly/14Kw4ww). The commission rejected that argument, saying browsers on mobile phones have to be accessible to those with disabilities. “Nothing in the CVAA or its legislative history suggests that Congress intended to carve out a specific type of ACS or equipment used with ACS from these general coverage categories,” said the order.
The commission had taken particular steps to make sure the new rule didn’t require companies to use specific software, but rather required them to make any software they do use to be accessible, agency officials said Tuesday. “We are carefully reviewing the Order and are concerned that the Commission’s rules may be broader than Congress envisioned in the statute,” said CEA Vice President-Regulatory Affairs Julie Kearney by email.
Though the order doesn’t specify how manufacturers should comply with it, the FCC said it plans “to consider the need for performance guidelines” to help the industry implement the order. Bridges and Mark Richert, director-public policy for the American Foundation for the Blind, said there’s already existing technology to make browsers on phones accessible for the blind, such as the voiceover system used by Apple products. “The high price tag was the problem, not so much that the tech wasn’t out there,” said Richert. Bridges said the vagueness of the statute could even be a good thing, allowing companies flexibility to achieve the rule’s goals.
The likely next CVAA rulemaking, the NPRM on user interface accessibility and video guides, will be issued “soon,” said FCC, industry and public interest officials. The NPRM circulating among commissioners is based on the work of the FCC Video Programming Accessibility Advisory Committee (VPAAC), using that group’s list of 11 “essential user interface functions” as the basis of the proposed rules, an FCC official said. The list includes on/off, volume control and configuration of closed captions. A Media Bureau spokeswoman declined to comment.
The NPRM tentatively concludes that Section 205 of the CVAA, which governs video program guides, would apply to multichannel video programming distributor content, while Section 204, which governs user interfaces, would apply to other electronics that display or receive video, said an FCC official. The official said the specifics of what is covered under Section 204 may still be up for debate, and CEA has previously filed comments with the FCC debating VPAAC’s findings on the specifics of essential buttons and where they must be placed under the proposed rules.
The NPRM discusses exemptions to the proposed rules for small cable operators, and how to define those operators, an agency official said. FCC officials said accessibility rules for video program guides have to go into effect two years after the rule appears in the Federal Register, but there’s currently no time limit specified for Section 204.