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Alt generation in Firefox
Firefox experiments with automatic text alternative text generation, using a local and therefore privacy-preserving (?) machine learning model:
Until recently it’s not been feasible for the browser to infer reasonably high quality alt text for images, without sending potentially sensitive data to a remote server. However, latest developments in AI have enabled this type of image analysis to happen efficiently, even on a CPU.
We are adding a feature within the PDF editor in Firefox Nightly to validate this approach. As we develop it further and learn from the deployment, our goal is to offer it for users who’d like to use it when browsing to help them better understand images which would otherwise be inaccessible.
This is good to see as so many websites lack text alternatives and this may be the first of its kind made by a company that didn't take part in large scale user privacy violations.