Visual Verification Again

Google, my favorite search site, has fallen into the visual verification trap, as outlined in the article about Google Under Fire for Excluding Blind Bloggers. I'm a huge fan of Google, however, this problem of visual verification is not new. Basically, to prevent their site from being spammed or from having numerous robots sign up for accounts, many sites (not just Google) have a graphical code that you have to read and type into an edit field, before you can complete the sign up process. The main problem for the blind, aside from not being able to "see" the code, is that our screen readers (like JAWS), cannot "see" the code. Thus, we are not able to read the characters and type them into the edit field. Some sites that have had this problem, have offered partial solutions, like giving an 800 number for the blind user to call for assistance, or offering a pre-recorded audio file of a synthesized voice reading the characters. However, these solutions are not fool proof, since in the first case, its a pain to have to rely on someone to be there to assist in the registration process. And, in the second instance, some of the audio files are hard to understand. This is done on purpose though, so that not just anyone can sign up for the service. I remind you that the audio file approach, while it may attempt to be limiting in its approach, its meant to give better access to blind people

The problem of visual verification may continue for some time. However, if you would like to speak out against this, then please write a quick note to Blogger Support. This will take you to a form that you can fill out. Explain that the verification code is not a good technique to use, since it blocks the blind. The reason being that our screen readers cannot read the graphic and thus, cannot tell us the letter/number combination to type in.

One proposed solution that I've heard of, to solve this verification problem, involves having the blind person fill in their email address, and then have an email sent to them which contains the code to write in. In this manner, the user could get the code, and do in an independent manner. In addition, it's more straight forward than listening to a possibly garbled audio file with the code in it.

Truthfully, this is why I haven't posted in awhile. Though the move by Google have only happened in the last few weeks, I misunderstood and thought that they were blocking access for those that already had blogs, and presenting that verification code for composing new posts to your blog. It wasn't until earlier this week, when I posted that I realized that this wasn't true. However, they are still preventing blind people from independently signing up for new blogs, and this needs to be changed.