Revisiting the accessibility of Saudi Arabia government websites

Abstract

With the significant inclusion of the Internet in nearly all aspects of our daily lives, achieving accessible e-government services that enable citizens to benefit from them and fulfill different users’ requirements, regardless of time and location constraints, has become a global aim. Although the Saudi government has initiated efforts to cope with this type of online services, the results from a study carried out in 2010 show a serious problem reaching the minimum requirement of WCAG 2.0 guidelines, implying a lack of equality between disabled and non-disabled people in benefiting from online governmental services. In order to track how Saudi e-government accessibility evolved from 2010 to 2016, this paper aims to evaluate the same websites visited previously. This may help in gaining an idea regarding the level of awareness about accessible e-government services in Saudi Arabia and whether the new policies the Saudi government has enforced on governmental websites have been effective or not. The results show an improvement in the accessibility of Saudi government websites since 2010, yet future recommendations are highlighted to further improve their accessibility.