Legal Aspects of the Internet

This is an example of a website that does not comply with the Disability Discrimination Act.

Websites must comply with the Disability Discrimination Act as an investigation carried out by The Disability Rights Commission found that many public websites practically ‘impossible’ for disabled people to use.
The main ‘types’ of websites that were the worst offenders were Banks, buying tickets & booking holidays online.
The ‘types’ of websites that were the most user friendly were Governments, business, leisure, e-commerce and web services.

The Act came into force October 1999 to ensure that companies and organisations provide the public with services reasonably accessible for people with disabilities.

The penalty for having such a website would be costly as someone with a disability may sue you.
The Website that you could go onto to enable you to design a website in accordance would be www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT.
The types of disabilities that you would have to consider would be epilepsy, vision impairments, deaf people, people with dexterity problems and people with autism.

The Data Protection Act 1998 has 3 concepts which are:

Obtaining
Holding
Disclosing

The Data Protection Act 1998 contains eight Data Protection Principles:

Personal data shall be processed fairly and lawfully.
Personal data shall be obtained only for one or more specified and lawful purposes, and shall not be further processed in any manner incompatible with that purpose or those purposes.
Personal data shall be adequate, relevant and not excessive in relation to the purpose or purposes for which they are processed.
Personal data shall be accurate and, where necessary, kept up to date.
Personal data processed for any purpose or purposes shall not be kept for longer than is necessary for that purpose or those purposes.
Personal data shall be processed in accordance with the rights of data subjects under this Act.
Appropriate technical and organizational measures shall be taken against unauthorised or unlawful processing of personal data and against accidental loss or destruction of, or damage to, personal data.
Personal data shall not be transferred to a country or territory outside the European Economic Area unless that country or territory ensures an adequate level of protection for the rights and freedoms of data subjects in relation to the processing of personal data.

The Data Protection Act 1998 applies to businesses that may deal with peoples personal details & such like.