Segala News & Events - Press Releases

Segala Helps to Build Internet Trust

Released: 16th May, 2006

Segala Becomes a Member of the W3C Content Label Incubator Group

Dublin, Ireland - Segala, a worldwide leader in web accessibility certification services with global headquarters in Dublin, Ireland, has announced that it has become a member of the W3C's (The World Wide Web Consortium - www.w3.org) first Incubator Activity Group to address the topic of "Content Labels".

The Incubator Activity is a new initiative from the W3C to foster the development of emerging Web-related technologies prior to the setting of standards and serves as a complement to the W3C Recommendation Track. The Content Label Incubator Group (XG) focuses on how online publishers, media owners and content providers can inform Search Engines, browsers, aggregators and other data systems, that their content is of a certain type, fulfils certain criteria or meets given standards, guidelines or requirements. To achieve this the XG is looking at use cases which reflect real world scenarios and which relate to the format, content and capabilities of different Search Engines, browsers and devices, child protection, accessibility and other factors.

Segala is the first organisation worldwide to provide a digital certificate and Trustmark which certifies sites for conformance to W3C's "Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0", and which is already available for web publishers and media owners to use. Through the Content Label Incubator Group, Segala will be working with the W3C to make this existing technology of more general applicability and thereby work towards a more trustworthy internet.

The W3C Content Label Incubator Group Charter website notes "To child protection systems like that operated by ICRA, we can now add trustmarks, such as Segala's accessibility certificate, and the proposed mobileOK system being devised by the Mobile Web Initiative (MWI) - all of which have the potential to make a significant contribution to content discovery and search."

Paul Walsh, CEO of Segala said, This is a big step forward for everybody who wants to see a trustworthy internet. Users want and need to trust a site to deliver the content they are looking for and Segala is delighted to be working with the W3C to help make this happen. Publishers and media owners now have a clear industry mandate to upgrade their sites and make them accessible and trusted by all their users. Segala's existing auditing services, digital certificate and Trustmark enable them to get started right away. It is end users who will benefit from this and that can only have a positive effect for the whole web, he added.

Other W3C Members who are sponsoring the W3C Content Label Incubator Group activity include: @semantics; Internet Content Rating Association (ICRA); Institute of Informatics & Telecommunications, NCSR; Institute for Learning and Research Technology (ILRT); University of Bristol; T-Online; Vodafone; and Yahoo!

Note to editors

About Segala

Segala is a worldwide independent authority and provider of web accessibility and mobile content auditing, testing, certification and Trustmark services. Segala provides accessibility conformance evaluations, audits and certification for web and mobile publishers, developers and agencies to satisfy usability and accessibility guidelines and legislation.

Segala is a sponsor member of the W3C Content Label Incubator Group (XG-CL), a worldwide initiative to develop content labelling standards for the web. As an Associate member of the W3C, Segala also participates in the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) and is a Founding Sponsor of the Mobile Web Initiative (MWI). Segala is the first testing and compliance specialist worldwide to become an associate member of the GSMA. Segala has global headquarters in Dublin, Ireland. For further information visit www.segala.com.

About the Segala-Certified™ Trustmark

Segala is the first company worldwide to make a machine-readable content label available for web accessibility and mobile content by providing a visible Trustmark that is detectable by search engines and browsers. The Segala-Certified Trustmark provides a branded, certified and verifiable method that enables search engines and browsers to develop systems for users to filter and trust content that contain this Trustmark. It is the first Trustmark worldwide to be based on the method proposed by members of the W3C XG-CL activity and which is expected to exceed the previous content label standard, PICS, currently used by Microsoft Internet Explorer. O2 is the first major organization worldwide to adopt the Segala Trustmark as standard throughout its online content.

For Further Information, please visit:
W3C - http://www.w3.org
http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/wcl/wcl-charter-20060208

Contact:

Andrew Gerrard
Segala UK
Mobile: +44 (0) 7771 678605
Email: andrew [at] segala [dot] com
Web : www.segala.com

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