Blind Woman Sues 30 Websites over Handicap Accessibility

Have you ever considered how blind individuals navigate through the Internet? Although, it is not usually something that you just ponder on while eating your afternoon lunch, it is something to wonder about. Most commonly, they use the traditional text-to-speech software. These screen readers browse the website’s HTML to then convert it into sounds. Another example of assistive technology for the visually impaired is a refreshable braille display. The displays consist of raised dots to transport the websites text to the fingertips of the visitor.

Recently, a woman who is legally blind from Manhattan came forward claiming that there are websites which are discriminatory to the visually impaired. Maria Mendizabal is filing more than thirty individual lawsuits against companies known globally such as Nike, Barney’s, and Donna Karan. Her suit reads, “Useless websites are designed to be read by screen-reading software, blind and visually-impaired persons are unable to fully access websites, and the information, Products, and services contained thereon,” which is filed under the Americans with Disabilities Act.

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#DeleteFacebook

By Hannah Beldotti

Facebook is a social media platform available to anyone and everyone; ranked first on “Most Famous Social Network Sites Worldwide for January 2018,” it is heavily popular with a wide range of ages. Most people use it to connect with old friends and share updates on their life, however, within the last three weeks, many users have deleted their accounts including celebrities such as, Cher, Will Ferrell, and Elon Musk. Explaining the reasoning behind their actions, Cher stated, “it was very hard, but there are some things more important than money,” along with Will Ferrell who said he was, “very disturbed to hear about Cambridge Analytica’s  misuse of millions of Facebook user’s information.” In the recent weeks, it has been revealed that Facebook exploited at least 87 millions user’s information to a firm known as Cambridge Analytica through a third-party source. Cambridge Analytica is a consulting firm which provides many different data-driven services.

DDoS Attack this Morning on East Coast

A large scale denial of service attack (aka a “DDoS”) has most likely affected your browsing on your favorite websites today. Such sites, such as Twitter, Netflix, Amazon, Paypal, or even Reddit, have been attacked. A DDoS attack, according to USA Today, is when “someone, or a group of people, floods a particular site or service with large amounts of fake traffic in an attempt to overwhelm the system and take it offline.”

The issues have been addressed, and mostly pertained to the East Coast. All should be back online now. For more information click here.  Have a wonderful weekend!

 

By David DiMolfetta