Literature Reviews

Reviewed research papers, articles, and publications relevant to digital accessibility.

• AXECC: Benchmarking the Privacy and Accessibility Impact of Browser Extensions

  James Clarke, Maryam Mehrnezhad, Ehsan Toreini (2026) — ACM Transactions on Privacy and Security

  This paper presents AXECC, a novel automated framework for jointly measuring the web-tracking behaviour and accessibility impact of browser extensions at scale. The authors argue that while browser extensions are widely installed to improve the brows…

  • browser extensions
  • web tracking
  • privacy
  • accessibility testing
  • automated testing
  • WCAG
  • WAVE
  • Lighthouse
  • dark mode
  • screen readers
  • assistive technology

• Twitter A11y: A Browser Extension to Make Twitter Images Accessible

  Cole Gleason, Amy Pavel, Emma McCamey, Christina Low, Patrick Carrington, Kris M. Kitani, Jeffrey P. Bigham (2020) — CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

  This paper presents Twitter A11y, a browser extension designed to address the widespread lack of alternative text on images posted to Twitter. The authors note that while around 12% of Twitter content consists of images, only 0.1% of those images inc…

  • social media accessibility
  • alternative text
  • screen readers
  • image accessibility
  • optical character recognition
  • crowdsourcing
  • browser extensions
  • blindness
  • computer vision

• Web Browser Accessibility Using Open Source Software

  Željko Obrenović, Jacco van Ossenbruggen (2007) — Proceedings of the 2007 International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility (W4A)

  This paper presents AMICO:WEB, a middleware infrastructure designed to integrate open source and free software components into mainstream web browsers to improve accessibility. The authors from CWI Amsterdam identify a core problem: while the open so…

  • open source
  • middleware
  • multimodal interaction
  • browser extensions
  • assistive technology
  • software integration

• Accessmonkey: A Collaborative Scripting Framework for Web Users and Developers

  Jeffrey P. Bigham, Richard E. Ladner (2007) — Proceedings of the 2007 International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility (W4A)

  This paper introduces Accessmonkey, a JavaScript-based scripting framework that enables web users, developers, and researchers to collaboratively improve web accessibility through client-side page modifications. Built as an extension of the Greasemon…

  • web accessibility
  • web transcoding
  • browser extensions
  • JavaScript
  • collaborative accessibility
  • alternative text
  • screen readers
  • blind users
  • developer tools
  • user empowerment

• Hera-FFX: a Firefox add-on for semi-automatic web accessibility evaluation

  José L. Fuertes, Ricardo González, Emmanuelle Gutiérrez, Loïc Martínez (2009) — Proceedings of the 2009 International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility (W4A)

  This paper presents Hera-FFX, a Firefox browser add-on for semi-automatic web accessibility evaluation against WCAG 1.0, developed as a complete redesign of the earlier Hera online tool. The authors first establish a comprehensive list of 11 desirabl…

  • accessibility evaluation
  • evaluation tools
  • semi-automatic evaluation
  • browser extensions
  • WCAG 1.0
  • manual evaluation

• Augment browsing and standard profiling for enhancing web accessibility

  Silvia Mirri, Paola Salomoni, Catia Prandi (2011) — Proceedings of the International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility (W4A)

  This paper presents GAPforAPE (GreaseMonkey And Profiling for Accessible Pages Enhancement), a client-side system that automatically transcodes web content to meet individual users' accessibility needs and preferences. The system is built as a Firefo…

  • content transcoding
  • user profiling
  • browser extensions
  • social media accessibility
  • personalization
  • client-side adaptation
  • screen readers
  • low vision

• Developing Hera-FFX for WCAG 2.0

  José L. Fuertes, Emmanuelle Gutiérrez, Loïc Martínez (2011) — Proceedings of the International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility (W4A)

  This paper describes the redesign of Hera-FFX, a Mozilla Firefox extension for semi-automatic web accessibility evaluation, to support WCAG 2.0. The original Hera-FFX was built around WCAG 1.0's simpler two-level structure of guidelines and checkpoin…

  • accessibility evaluation
  • evaluation tools
  • WCAG 2.0
  • semi-automatic evaluation
  • browser extensions
  • manual evaluation

• Comparing Accessibility Evaluation Plug-ins

  Tânia Frazão, Carlos Duarte (2020) — Proceedings of the 17th International Web for All Conference (W4A)

  This paper from the University of Lisbon systematically compares eight free Chrome browser extensions for automated accessibility evaluation: Microsoft Accessibility Insights, ACCESS Assistant Community, ARC Toolkit, aXe Chrome Plugin, Lighthouse, Te…

  • automated testing
  • accessibility testing
  • WCAG
  • web accessibility
  • evaluation tools
  • browser extensions