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Achieving an inclusive society by designing and implementing accessible ICTs

ITU-T Joint Coordination Activity on Accessibility and Human Factors

Session 283

09:00–10:45, Thursday, 22 March 2018 Room K2, ITU Montbrillant Captioning Thematic Workshop Speakers/Panellists  Link to WSIS Action Lines  Link to SDGs  Summary Document  Documents 

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The ITU is leading the way in mainstreaming accessibility in the development of international standards whenever possible and applicable, which began starting way back in 1991. This is when it standardized text phones used by persons who were deaf. The goal was having them be interoperable globally.  The hearing world could use every voice and audio telephone in the world while audio based phone usage which in those days was denied to the deaf. There was no email and no SMS.  This gap later created a need that became what we call relay services for the deaf.

 Efforts at the implementation of these some accessibility standards were not entirely successful because countries decided to follow their own path and thus created isolated communities non-interoperable text phones. As for other accessibility standards, many companies felt it was a poor investment implement anything for such a small market.  This implementation allowing persons with disabilities to access many services that persons who are not disabled take for granted in earlier times was originally created and manufactured by the deaf community themselves. The situation is improving and has found that the rest of the world benefits when persons with disabilities can. lead independent lives.  Now there are real working products and services that are using ITU accessible standards that aid persons with disabilities so that persons with disabilities can be independently functional in the real time world.  

The workshop will focus on the accessibility work in the ITU and how it coordinated by the ITU member operated ITU group called the Joint Coordination Activity on Accessibility and Human Factors (JCA-AHF) whose job it is to track and record all accessibility work in all of the ITU sectors: ITU-T, ITU-D and ITU-R. The JCA-AHF also advises the ITU main secretariat on issues of accessibility from a member’s point of view in practical areas of accessibility. This is because the ITU is attended by persons with disabilities who are members as well as ITU staff.

The workshop has speakers who have disabilities that make them the experts regarding whether the standards being created will work or not.  It goes with the saying “Nothing about us without us”. The ITU with the help of the JCA-AHF has listened.

More detailed information on the workshop as well as presentation slides are available on the ITU-T JCA-AHF webpage at: https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-T/jca/ahf/Pages/20180322-programme.aspx

 

Moderator

Andrea J. Saks, ITU-T JCA-AHF Chairman

Speakers/Panellists

  • Andrea Saks: ITU-T JCA-AHF Chairman, International Telecommunications specialist for the deaf

Title: What is the ITU-T Joint Coordination Activity on Accessibility and Human Factors (JCA-AHF) and how does it work?
The JCA-AHF coordinates activities related to accessibility and human factors in order to avoid duplication of work, and to ensure that the needs of persons with disabilities and persons with specific needs are taken into account, in accordance with PP Resolution 175 (Rev. Busan, 2014) of ITU Plenipotentiary Conference and .Resolution 70 (Rev. Hammamet, 2016) of World Telecommunication Standardization Assembly (WTSA). The JCA-AHF was established in December 2007 and reports to TSAG since June 2015 ( it reported to ITU-T Study Group 2 previously). Its modified  Terms of Reference  were approved by TSAG in May 2017.  

  • Tom Pey, Royal Society for Blind Children (RSBC), UK
    Title:  Turning Aspiration into a worldwide reality with ITU-T F. 921 – Audio-based network navigation system for persons with vision impairment

Summary:  Inspired by six blind young people who wanted to navigate The London Underground using no more than a smartphone app., supported by a generous grant from Google.org and informed by thousands of blind people across the world, Wayfindr.org worked with ITU to turn aspiration into reality.  Today, providers of public transport and owners of public spaces and buildings across the world collaborate with blind people as they understand and implement the ITU Recommendation ITU-T F. 921. It is an example where the needs of disabled people will make the world more accessible for all. (Introductory video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iBq4ZWmC_vs&feature=youtu.be )

  • Beat Kleeb, World Federation of the Deaf (WFD), Switzerland
    Title: Communication Access for Deaf Persons through Telephone Relay Services

Deafness and hearing loss are invisible and underestimated disabilities with serious consequences for all aspects of life. However, there are accessibility tools available for visual communication with deaf and hard of hearing persons. One of these tools are telephone relay services.

The UN Convention on the Rights for Persons with Disabilities and most national laws on Telecommunication state, that telephony must be equally accessible for all citizens. There are also several technical and operational standards which guide the operation of telephone relay services.

Nevertheless, there are only a small number of countries where there are such relay services in operation that enable equal access to a direct dialogue over the telephone in real time. The new Swiss Relay Service Procom demonstrates, how such a telephone relay service enables communication by simultaneous use of video, text and voice.

  • Masahito Kawamori, ITU-T Q26/16 (Accessibility to multimedia systems and services) Rapporteur, Keio University, Japan

Session's link to WSIS Action Lines

  • AL C3 logo C3. Access to information and knowledge

Session's link to Sustainable Development Process

  • Goal 4: Quality education logo Goal 4: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all
  • Goal 10: Reduced inequalities logo Goal 10: Reduce inequality within and among countries

Session Summary

CUsersgreenspanDocumentsOutcomesWSIS_Draft_outcome_2018_v5.pdf

Documents

ACHIEVING_AN_INCLUSIVE_SOCIETY_BY_DESIGNING_AND_IMPLEMENTING_ACCESSIBLE_ICTS_22.03.2018.doc Captioning-283_RC.pdf

Links

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