Accessibility Clarity at Last! What the New DOJ Regulations Mean for You
The U.S. Department of Justice announced in July 2022 its intent to write new regulations in 2023 about making state and local government websites and apps accessible.
The final rule became official in June 2024, applying to government websites, mobile apps, public schools, and public higher education.
The ADA applies to these websites and apps even without the new regulation, as evidenced by DOJ findings against counties in Texas for inaccessible voting websites.
The National Federation of the Blind filed comments with the DOJ about the proposed regulations, expressing concerns about exceptions that could be unfair to disabled people.
The DOJ tried to adopt similar regulations more than 12 years ago but did not, leading to skepticism about whether the new regulations would ever come to fruition.
It looks like it is finally happening, which is great news!
Adobe Sued for Hidden Fees & Subscription Practices
The US Justice Department is suing Adobe for hiding fees and complicating subscription cancellations.
The lawsuit claims Adobe enrolls users in expensive subscription plans without clear disclosure – seemingly “hiding” the terms of its paid plans in fine print and behind hyperlinks.
The early termination fees for canceling subscriptions can amount to hundreds of dollars.
Adobe’s cancellation process involves navigating multiple pages and pop-ups.
Customers face similar obstacles when canceling subscriptions via phone or chat.
The lawsuit alleges Adobe’s practices break consumer protection laws.
Adobe executives are also targeted for directing these practices.
Google is Crawling My Site a LOT! That’s Good, Right? Maybe (probably) Not.
Google’s Gary Illyes warns that sudden spikes in crawling activity on your site could be a bad sign, indicating potential issues.
Two common problems that can cause crawling spikes are infinite spaces (like calendars and product filters) and website hacks.
Infinite spaces can generate unlimited potential URLs, exciting crawlers to crawl excessively. Use robots.txt to block these areas.
Hackers may inject spam onto reputable sites, triggering a crawling frenzy as Google initially interprets it as new content before realizing it’s malicious.
Treat unexpected sharp increases in crawling as a symptom of an issue until proven otherwise, rather than assuming it’s positive.
For hacked sites, identify and fix the vulnerability, clean the hacked content, harden security, and request a review from Google to remove warnings or blacklists.
Use Google’s URL removal tool to quickly deindex hacked pages, and focus on improving overall site quality beyond just removing hacked content.
Lingering SEO impacts from hacks may persist for months until the site recovers Google’s trust.
Woo issued a Developer Advisory about an XSS Vulnerability in WooCommerce 8.8.0 and later. Read more about it and update your Woos now (if you haven’t already).
