
legal information references
filed under: legal | referenceBy launching your site, you are publishing your content to the public domain. While you are free to post what you wish – do consider any legal implications that might apply. This will depend very much on the purpose and audience of your website.
If you are a charitable organisation, for example, your website will likely need to comply with a certain level of the WCAG directives.
references to relevant legislation:
- Data Protection Act 1998 / Data Protection on gov.uk
- Equality Act 2010 / Guidance notes from gov.uk
- Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0
- Consumer Rights Act 2015 / Consumer Rights on gov.uk
Typically, for most small to medium websites offering products and services to local and national audiences, the website should include the following:
- Terms of Service
- Terms & Conditions / Delivery Details / Returns & Cancellation Policy
- Privacy Statement
- Accessibility information
- Disclaimer (for third party content)
Here are a few links to references and resources, as well as some samples for you to read through. As a very minimum, you should cover both accessibility as well as privacy in your statement.
How to write good statements for privacy & accessibility:
- Writing a Good Accessibility Statement
(Jez Lemon is an accessibility expert) - Writing an accessibility statement
(Léonie Watson is a blind web developer and accessibility consultant) - How to write an effective Accessibility Statement
(Hassell Inclusion is a digital inclusion and accessibility consultancy) - How to Create a Website Privacy Policy
(wikiHow)
Templates, tools & examples
please note: this is not an endorsement of any of the listed items per se.
Consider these references, mere examples to learn from, rather than tools you have to use.
- example: Accessibility Statement, Hassle Inclusion
- example: gov.uk
- example: nomensa
- Accessibility Statement Template
- Accessibility Statement generator
- Free privacy statement
- Sample Privacy Policy Template
- Privacy Policy Generator
- Sample Website Privacy Policy (UK)
Hopefully you will find these links useful – we would recommend that you edit all text to fit your project. Try to make these formal text copy sound less impersonal and cold, and more people-friendly – fitting the spirit of your project, of course :)
You might want have a look at our legal info page for reference ~ our wording is a little more friendly than some of the examples listed.