Designing and developing for fairer access starts with an  awareness of the power imbalances between ourselves and the people we serve.

Accessibility

Accessibility means designing for people with a wide range of abilities so that they can successfully use the tools and resources we provide. All people we serve should have a welcoming, accessible, and useful experience, including those with visual, auditory, physical, cognitive, and other impairments.  

There are federal requirements around accessibility that we as a federal agency are required to meet. The current Section 508 standards state that all electronic content should conform to WCAG 2.0 AA guidelines. As such, we design, build, test, and remediate to conform to those standards.   

If you’re building web or print products:

• Read our accessibility guidelines before you begin the design process.
• Audit your product for Section 508 compliance before it is launched. 

Access

Providing meaningful access to web-based products means building with an eye toward the needs of people who rely on smaller or older devices and/or those using low-bandwidth networks. As of August 2022, more than half of all visitors to the CFPB’s website were using a mobile device. The ratio is even higher for our Spanish-language content, which three-quarters of visitors use a mobile device to access. Also consider the 25% of Americans who do not have high-speed internet access at home. 

Ensure you’re taking the steps below: 

Design and research from a mobile-first standpoint   

Designing for a limited screen size helps to prioritize the most important features needed to accomplish the goals of your product and encourages the development of a leaner product. In contrast, designing desktop-first may lead to developing features that may not be usable at mobile scale.  

Optimize code for the best possible performance  

Code should be as lightweight as possible. Evaluate your product for performance factors, such as first contentful paint, first meaningful paint, and speed index. Use one of the many free automated tools available to analyze speed, performance, and quality.  

Working mobile-first and optimizing for performance and accessibility also has SEO benefits. The most frequently used search engines now favor mobile-friendly sites and accessible features.  

FURTHER READING

Pew Research Center’s fact sheet on internet and broadband usage (April 2021)

Representative imagery 

Represent people in photography and illustration thoughtfully. This goes beyond showing a wide range of ethnicities and abilities in a single visual product. Consider who is shown, in what context, and how they are represented. 

Take these steps whether you’re casting a video, illustrating people, choosing stock photography, planning a photo shoot, or any other image production activities. 

Uncover your own assumptions and biases

If you haven’t already, take steps to uncover the assumptions and biases you hold, and to raise awareness of the needs of communities and groups that are different from yourself and your team by running through the frames of reference exercise.    

Understand the group you’re representing and trying to reach 

If there is a specific group you’re trying to reach and that you plan to represent in your product, do your research so that you’re aware of any sensitivities. Investigate their historic and current relationship to the government and their relationship to the topic. There may be negative connotations or associations that you’re not aware of when you represent a specific group in a specific situation.   

Make sure that any representations of people experiencing a difficult or undesirable situation do not reinforce existing negative stereotypes.  

Examine potential hazards and harms

Consider the hazards and harms that could occur as a result of your work. In particular, look out for any representations that might unintentionally perpetuate racial profiling or stereotypes, enshrined status quo and power structures, and systemic bias.   

Hazards and harms

In a Medium article from 2019, the design researcher and author Erika Hall suggests annotating wireframes with hazards and harms. The concept is similar to occupational safety maps that annotate floor plans with specific physical, chemical, and electrical hazards.  

For example, if a searchable database contains personally identifiable information, consider how that information could be misused. Could an abuser search the database to locate their victim? If so, the hazards of this database include data misuse and targeted abuse, which could cause harm to the participant or community, including fear, anxiety, and potentially physical danger.    

Identifying hazards and harms in advance helps us modify our designs to mitigate them. 

Related pages

• Overview
• Setting the foundation
• Conducting research