Important information on the inaccessibility of Portable Document Format (PDF) for people who are blind or vision impaired
Portable Document Format (PDF) is a common way for organizations to publish documents. However, PDF documents are, in many instances, still inaccessible to people who are blind or vision impaired.
The Human Rights and Equal Oppurtunity Commission (HREOC) has commented on the matter of PDFs, and other inaccessible formats for people who are blind or vision impaired, in their ‘World Wide Web Access: Disability Discrimination Act Advisory Notes, Version 3.2. August 2002’, which states:
“The way in which information is presented will affect its accessibility. Documents that are presented in an image-based format such as GIF or TIF will not be accessible to people who are blind or vision-impaired and who rely on braille or synthetic-speech output to read computer screens.
The Portable Document Format (PDF) file system developed by Adobe has become widely used for making documents available on web pages. Despite considerable work done by Adobe, PDF remains a relatively inaccessible format to people who are blind or vision-impaired. Software exists to provide some access to the text of some PDF documents, but for a PDF document to be accessible to this software, it must be prepared in accordance with the guidelines that Adobe have developed. Even when these guidelines are followed, the resulting document will only be accessible to those people who have the required software and the skills to use it. The Commission's view is that organisations who distribute content only in PDF format, and who do not also make this content available in another format such as RTF, HTML, or plain text, are liable for complaints under the DDA. Where an alternative file format is provided, care should be taken to ensure that it is the same version of the content as the PDF version, and that it is downloadable by the user as a single document, just as the PDF version is downloaded as a single file.
It should also be borne in mind that some content, such as graphs and maps, cannot be made accessible online to people who are blind or vision-impaired. Organisations who need to make such pictorial content available need to consider strategies for making it accessible, for example, by using qualified contractors to produce tactual maps and diagrams on request”.
(Source: http://www.humanrights.gov.au/disability_rights/standards/www_3/www_3.html#s2_3)