Press Releases

Budapest, May 6, 2014 18:00

Mobile devices are the most immediate and easy tools to opening the gate to the Internet, without which we seem to be close to being unable to live, but how readily are they available for opening the gate to a vision impaired, a deaf or a disabled person while keeping in touch with the world outside is also their natural need? This was the subject of the round table Magyar Telekom organised on the Equal Opportunity Day.

The Internet and mobile phone have become by today our every day, indispensable tools: we chat, send messages, take photos and notes, prepare our time tables, go about banking and read using our smart phones, tablets and laptops. How has digital revolution changed the situation of people living with disabilities? What kind of problems do they come across in this regard and how could they get more out of technological development? Participants of Magyar Telekom’s Equal Opportunity Day were in search of answers to these questions and also several others at the round table organised on May 5, on the European Equal Opportunity Day.

“Cooperation among sectors is needed to create digital equality”—said Attila Fülöp, the Deputy State Secretary for Family Affairs and Equality Policy .  He added: “a perfect example of this is today’s round-table meeting attended by the non-governmental organisations concerned, the business sphere and the government as well. We have to jointly draw the attention of the population to people living with disabilities. The task of the government is to create the legal environment and to promote closing the gap by various modes of development. We believe in the philosophy of universal planning, which also drives for the implementation of innovations that are equally easy to use for people living without and with disabilities”, highlighted Attila Fülöp.

Ádám Kósa, European Parliament representative added: “the smart phone, for example, opens the world also for the vision impaired and deaf as well as hard of hearing people, bridging a huge gap. Closing the digital divide, an important element of which is changing the attitude of the society, also figures as a key task in the program of the European Union.”

Every Hungarian non-governmental organisation concerned sent their representative to the event, according to whom, although there is still a great deal to do, there are a great number of good practices in the areas of the initiatives taken by both the government and the business sphere. “Digital access is an area of key importance for the vision impaired, as for what used to be LORM manual alphabet has by today almost totally become accessible and with this an enormous info-communication gap has been possible to close. By today the smart phone has become the most important aid for us thanks to the various, mainly navigational, applications”—explained Gábor Angyal, head of communications at the Hungarian Federation of Blind and Particularly Sighted.

“We believe it is information that needs to be rendered accessible to all. That is why we have launched our Internet sign language service, which, as an online solution, also relies on the support of providers of telecommunication services. Using the proper tools the process can become even more smoothly running, so the future has started already” – added to it Róbert Ormódi, managing director of the Hungarian Federation of Deaf and Hard of Hearing.

“Being a leading provider of telecommunication services we consider it is our obligation to move equal opportunities into the forefront also in the area of digital solutions. It is our important aim to improve digital literacy among people living with disabilities as well, as close to six hundred thousand of them live among us in Hungary. On the occasion of the Equal Opportunity Day we would like to give a gift to those living with disabilities in the form of our Hello Holnap! tariff package, which grants them discount access to our services and extends options that can be adapted to the individual’s special life situation” – said Iván Rózsa, Magyar Telekom’s corporate communications director.

Education is very important for the company, that is the reason why it started its Mobile School program as well, in the course of which children at numerous schools of the country are explained the opportunities and threats inherent in the Internet and the correct use of mobile devices. The Mobile School just happened to visit the Pető Institute [1] last week.

“We, unfortunately, often have to be confronted with the fact that the first stumbling block in bridging the gap is the attitude of people who live without a disability, because they assume that people with an intellectual disability do not actually need it. It is very important that we should teach everybody to use the new devices, otherwise the gap will only continue to grow”—added Anna Kapocsi-Pécsi, professional leader of the Hungarian Association for Persons with Intellectual Disability.

József Szakály, general secretary of the National Federation of Disabled Personswelcomed the fact that the world has opened up to disabled persons through the Internet. They can now access places that will never become physically accessible to them, yet they can still view them with the help of various devices. The National Media and Info-communications Authority (NMHH) conducted an interesting research in 2013, according to the outcome of which the greater majority of disabled persons use info-communication tools in their everyday life, as leading-edge technology greatly helps their integration.

Also attending the round-table discussion was Zsanett Adámi world para swimming champion, who, as a secondary school student, could not even think of living without mobile devices and the use of the Internet. „For me the laptop and the tablet are enormous help in taking notes at school and they make learning so much easier for me. It is much simpler to communicate with the help of these devices, as, for example, irrespective of the fact that I learn as a private student due to swimming, I am not left out of anything. I can even share my results on community sites, but I also collect information from the net”—she provided an account of her personal experiences.

The Sustainability Media Club also had its representative present in the meeting; Bence György TV2 program and news director said that as a mass communication corporation they at TV2 also consider it very important that the programs should be accessible to those who live with disabilities, for which reason the audience of the channel are provided captioned news and program broadcasts of daily 12 hours. “Of course, we also strive to be fully accessible as a workplace”, added the news director.

Participants in the round-table meeting all agreed that the creation of digital equality is a basic precondition for making sure that everybody should have equal opportunities to become part of the information society.

[1]Special school for conductive education for children with motor disorders