Workshop, 5.3 Biometrics in the EN 301 549 standard, 2026-06-03

Participants

Anne Thyme Nørregaard, Pär Lannerö, Kosei Oki, Erik Gustafsson Spagnoli (taking notes), Tobias Nyhuus Jensen, Viet Ba Hirvola, Christer Janzon, Robin Liendeborg, Nadia Törnroos.

Notes

Tobias has joined the DS/S-437 IT Accessibility Committee at Danish Standards. The committee develops and contributes to accessibility standards and guidance within the IT sector, and it has tie-ins with the development of the EN 301 549 standard.

IAAP Nordic event on October 1st in Iceland. Lainey Feingold is expected to speak. Fee for members. Anne is speaking at a public sector focused event for Digitaliseringsstyrelsen about IAAP certifications to raise the number of certifications in Denmark.

Kosei will talk about intersectionality and accessibility at a conference in Germany. Also doing research through Teach Access Europe about the Danish learning system treats accessibility. Tobias can help out and mentions that previous research showed that their education curriculum is based on demands from companies.

Viet mentions that the Finnish supervisory authority has shared the draft and requested feedback for:

• prEN 18340 “Accessibility of support services for products and services”
• prEN 18339 “Accessibility of information presented in non-digital forms on and about products and services”

Pär said there will be an event by AccessibleEU Sweden on October 12th, 13:00–17:00, which will focus on accessibility standards. An invitation will be sent out after the summer vacation. (Save the date!)

Reports in Sweden are now unmasked from PTS thanks to Erik formally objecting to the previous censoring. Apotea, Åhléns, MQ, and Biltema are companies that have so far received their reports.

Denmark and Finland do not want to be the first to impose fines, waiting for other countries to take the first step.

Parts of the ongoing EAA court case in France have been wrongfully thrown out, partly due to RGAA not requiring companies with income below €250m to follow accessibility regulations. The lower court does not understand the differences between EAA and RGAA. It will most likely be taken up in a higher court. (Read more in the Web a11y Slack thread.)

5.3 Biometrics in the EN 301 549 standard

Anne has made changes to the structure to be more aligned with WCAG.

Pär suggested that we could add our ideas for future improvements of the standard as an addition to the document outline.

There’s a need to align the Key terms that are already in the EN standard, so we do not repeat or contradict them.

Robin and Anne will find a time to sync and present a version for the group.