Fw: NFB Certifies eBusiness Leaders

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Steve Pattison" <srp@bigpond.net.au>
To: "VIP-L" <vip-l@softspeak.com.au>
Sent: Saturday, May 17, 2003 8:38 PM
Subject: Fwd: NFB Certifies eBusiness Leaders


From: David Andrews dandrews@visi.com
To: nfb-talk@nfbnet.org

NFB Certifies eBusiness Leaders HP, Wells Fargo, and the U.S.
Social Security Administration for Web Accessibility

http://www.nfb.org/coming/wells_ebusiness.htm

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

National Federation of the Blind Certifies eBusiness
Leaders HP, Wells Fargo and the U.S. Social
Security Administration for Web Accessibility

Baltimore, MD, May 12, 2003  The National Federation of the Blind (NFB), the
nation's largest consumer
and advocacy membership organization of blind persons, today announced the
first national recipients of
its Nonvisual Accessibility Web Application (NVA) Certification. The first
companies and national
organizations to be recognized by the NFB for their efforts in the area of
Web accessibility are HP,
Wells Fargo & Company (NYSE: WFC), and the U.S. Social Security
Administration.

In support of companies that stand behind every blind Americans right to
full and active participation
on the Internet, the NFB enacted the NVA certification program to recognize
organizations that construct
Web sites to be as fundamentally usable by the blind as by the sighted.
Todays announcement recognizes
HP, Wells Fargo, and the U.S. Social Security Administration as leaders in
Web accessibility for the
visually impaired in their respective fields and also demonstrates the
growing success of the
certification program in assisting Web site owners to address the issue of
creating content and services
that are accessible to all.

HP, Wells Fargo and the U.S. Social Security Administration are leaders in
Web accessibility, said Dr.
Marc Maurer, President, National Federation of the Blind. We created the
certification process so that
Internet accessibility leaders, such as these, could be publicly recognized
by the NFB for their
efforts. We hope that more companies and organizations will follow the
example that these innovators
have set and make Web accessibility a priority in their organizations.

Certification was granted after the NFB conducted task-performance tests of
the primary functions of the
organizations Web sites. It was determined that a visually impaired user can
perform the primary
functions of the Web sites using at least two talking-screen access
programs. As part of the
certification program, NFB will continuously monitor these Web sites for
accessibility using an
automated system that flags potential problems for review by blind users.

This certification is a significant step towards our goal of connecting
everyone to the power of
technology by integrating accessibility into core business functions across
HP, said Marius Haas, vice
president of worldwide eBusiness, HP. Supporting these types of measures
helps ensure that HP products,
services, and content on hp.com are accessible to everyone, regardless of
their abilities.

The Internet provides a new medium to expand access to the visually impaired
and blind, said Avid
Modjtabai, executive vice president and head of Wells Fargos Internet
Services Group. Wells Fargo is
pleased to be the nations first and only financial institution to be
certified by the National
Federation of the Blind. And, we are committed to bringing financial
services to all of our customers
including people who are blind or visually impaired.

The Social Security Administrations re-designed Web
sitewww.socialsecurity.govis easier to navigate and
more accessible to all visitors, including people with visual and other
physical disabilities, said Jo
Anne Barnhart, commissioner of Social Security. Social Securitys programs
touch the lives of nearly
every American. Our Web site offers online services to people at every stage
of life.

The NFB worked closely with the technology community to develop the
procedures by which the Web sites
and applications of these organizations may be certified. HP, Wells Fargo,
and the U.S. Social Security
Administration worked with SSB Technologies of San Francisco, an
NFB-designated Web Accessibility
Consultant (WAC), to prepare for certification.

For more information about the NFB-NVA Certification program, visit
http://www.nfb.org/seal/intro.htm.
About the NFB
With more than 50,000 members and 700 local and state affiliates and
chapters, the NFB is the largest
and most influential membership organization of blind people in the United
States. As a consumer and
advocacy organization, NFB is the leading force in the blindness field today
and the voice of the
nation's blind.

About Wells Fargo & Company
Wells Fargo & Company is committed to serving the diverse needs of our
customer base by making our
products and services accessible to our customers with disabilities. Wells
Fargo is a diversified
financial services company with $370 billion in assets, providing banking,
insurance, investments,
mortgage, and consumer finance from more than 5,800 stores and the Internet
(wellsfargo.com) across
North America and elsewhere internationally. Wells Fargo was recently ranked
the #1 Internet banking
site by Gomez, the preeminent Internet quality-measurement firm.

CONTACTS:
Patricia A. Maurer
Director of Community Relations
National Federation of the Blind
pmaurer@nfb.org
(410) 659-9314, ext. 272

Wells Fargo
Wendy Grover, Senior Vice President of Corporate Communications
415-396-5905
groverw@wellsfargo.com
SSB Technologies
Tim Springer
415-359-5521
timsp@ssbtechnologies.com

Regards Steve
mailto:srp@bigpond.net.au
MSN Messenger:  Internetuser383@hotmail.com

Received on Saturday, 17 May 2003 21:09:32 UTC