National Association of the Deaf make legal case against Netflix

The National Associations of the Deaf (NAD) have been given the go-ahead by a federal court in Massachusetts to bring a legal action against Netflix. The NAD is attempting to make it a legal requirement for Netflix to offer closed captions on its streamed movie service.

NAD is suing Netflix under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Netflix tried to dismiss NADs claim as they said the ADA only applied to public buildings and structures, not to Internet services. The court denied Netflix’s motion for dismissal, stating that it would be “irrational to conclude” that “places of public accommodation are limited to actual physical structures. …In a society in which business is increasingly conducted online, excluding businesses that sell services through the Internet from the ADA would run afoul of the purposes of the ADA and would severely frustrate Congress’s intent that individuals with disabilities fully enjoy the goods, services, privileges and advantages, available indiscriminately to other members of the general public.”

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