36 CFR Part 1194 - Proposed Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Standards and Guidelines NPRM - Preamble

F. Harmonization with European Activities

1. History

In 2006, as noted above, the Access Board convened a Telecommunications and Electronic and Information Technology Advisory Committee to review and update the existing standards and guidelines. The Advisory Committee met from 2006 to 2008. Four of the forty-one members of the Advisory Committee were international stakeholders: the European Commission, Canada, Australia, and Japan. Among other issues, the Advisory Committee addressed harmonization of standards across markets and worked closely with standard-setting bodies in the United States and abroad. The Advisory Committee issued its final report in 2008.

While the Access Board was in the process of updating its existing 508 Standards and 255 Guidelines, a similar process began in Europe to create the first European set of ICT accessibility standards. As a result of the 2005 EU-US Economic Initiative, the Access Board and the European Commission began to work closely on the issue of Information and Communications Technology standards (See: http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2006/june/tradoc_127643.pdf).

In 2005, the European Commission released Mandate 376, “Standardisation Mandate to CEN, CENELEC, and ETSI in Support of European Accessibility Requirements for Public Procurement of Products and Services in the ICT Domain” (http://www.ictsb.org/Working_Groups/DATSCG/Documents/M376.pdf). The Mandate required the three European standards organizations—European Committee for Standardization (CEN), European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC) and European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI)—to: inventory European and international accessibility requirements; provide an assessment of suitable testing and conformity schemes; and, develop a European accessibility standard for ICT products and services along with guidance and support material for public procurements including an online toolkit.

In 2010, the Board released an ANPRM based on the 2008 TEITAC Report. We then published a second ANPRM in 2011 and took notice of the standardization work going on in Europe at the time, stating: 
[T]he Board is interested in harmonizing with standards efforts around the world in a timely way. Accordingly, the Board is now releasing this second Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (2011 ANPRM) to seek further public comment on specific questions and to harmonize with contemporaneous standardization efforts underway by the European Commission.

In February 2013, the European Commission published its draft standard EN 301 549 V1.0.0 (2013-02), “Accessibility requirements for public procurement of ICT products and services in Europe” (http://www.etsi.org/deliver/etsi_en/301500_301599/301549/01.00.00_20/en_301549v010000c.pdf). The vote on the standard was completed in February 2014. The European Standard has been formally adopted by all three European standards organizations – CEN, CENELEC, and ETSI. The standards are now available to the target audience, government officials, who may use the standards as technical specifications or award criteria in public procurements of ICT products and services. The standard harmonizes and facilitates the public procurement of accessible ICT products and services within Europe. More information is available at: http://www.mandate376.eu/

2. Comparison of Proposed Rule with EN 301 549 Standard

a. General Comparison: Approach, Terminology and Organization

In this NPRM, the Board makes several proposals that are similar to those in the most recently published EN 301 549. Both the proposed rule and EN 301 549 address the functions of technology, rather than categories of technologies. Similarly, both offer technical requirements and functional performance criteria for accessible ICT. For example, our use of the phrase “information and communication technology” (ICT) in this NRPM, as a replacement of the existing term “electronic and information technology,” originates in the common usage of ICT throughout Europe and the rest of the world. Moreover, both documents are organized in similar ways, in that they both have initial scoping and definitions chapters, followed by separate chapters containing technical requirements and functional performance criteria.

Organizationally, the documents differ in several respects. These general differences are outlined in Table 2 below:

Table 2 - Formatting differences between the NPRM and EN 301 549

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b. Specific Examples: Differing Treatment of Similar Concepts

Real-Time Text Functionality

In this NPRM, the Board proposes that where ICT provides real-time voice communication, it must also support real-time text (RTT) functionality, as described in 410.6. Most significantly, the Board proposes to require that where ICT interoperates with Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) products using Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), it must support the transmission of RTT that conforms to RFC 4103 (RTP Payload for Text Conversion (2005)). In the Major Issues section, the Board asks whether additional standards for real-time text, which are in the process of being finalized (such as XEP-0301), should also be referenced. See Section V.D, Question 8. The proposed rule limits the approach to RTT by proposing to only incorporate by reference a maximum of two standards for RTT interoperating with VoIP.

In contrast, EN 301 549 allows the use of multiple standards for RTT. In addition to referencing RFC 4103 (section 6.3.3(b)), it permits the use of four other standards and an unspecified “common specification” for RTT exchange. The only criterion in the common specification is that it must indicate a method for indicating loss or corruption of characters. For a further discussion of RTT functionality, see Section V.D (Major Issues - Real-Time Text) below.

We are not proposing to adopt the other four standards referenced by EN 301 549 because they are not applicable to the type of technology used in the United States. Just as mobile phones are not directly compatible between the United States and Europe (i.e., CDMA phone systems versus GSM (Global System Mobile)), portions of the four standards referenced in EN 301 549 are simply not relevant in the U.S. market, and there are no indications that they will have domestic relevance in the near future.

The standards referenced by EN 301 549 address more than just real-time text functionality. Some are quite broad and address several communications features, such as video speed and accuracy. One example of such a standard is ETSI TS 126 114 (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS)) which covers voice, video, and data transmission rates and speeds. This standard supports an approach to communication known as “total communication.” We are not proposing to adopt this approach. In the 2010 ANPRM, the Board proposed transmission accuracy rates and speeds for video, text and voice data, based on recommendations from the Advisory Committee. In response, we received numerous comments questioning the accuracy of the proposed rates, the sources for the proposals and the research underlying the proposed rates. Consequently, the Board removed those proposals in the 2011 ANPRM.

Question 3. We are seeking further information on the benefits and costs associated with adopting standards that address total communications, including voice, video, and data transmission rates and speeds. We seek recommendations for specific standards that the Board might reference to address total communication.

Video Communication

In this NPRM, the Board proposes that where ICT provides two-way voice communication that includes real-time video functionality, the quality of the video must be sufficient to support communication using sign language (section 410.8). The provision specifies a desired outcome and does not provide specific technical requirements. This approach resulted from public comments in response to our proposal in the 2010 ANPRM. Public commenters noted there were no existing standards supporting the technical requirements the Board had proposed concerning resolution, frame rates, and processing speed. In the 2011 ANPRM, the Board elected to remove those proposed technical requirements in favor of simply requiring the quality of the video to be sufficient to support communications using sign language. We received no comments on this approach, and retain it here in this NPRM.

EN 301 549, on the other hand, takes a different tact. In “6.6 Video Communication,” the standard specifies numeric measurements for such features as resolution (6.6.2), frame rates (6.6.3) and alternatives to video-based services (6.7). This approach is similar to our proposal in the 2010 ANPRM, which, as noted, the Board dropped due to significant negative comments.

In general, the approaches taken in EN 301 549 and this NPRM are similar and complimentary. The Access Board’s proposed rule contains less detail in some proposed provisions, as discussed above. We elected to pursue this course in response to public comments and our desire to make use of a number of voluntary consensus standards by incorporating them by reference. This approach will result in better harmonization of accessibility standards worldwide.