Amendments have been made to the Act on the Provision of Digital Services (the Digital Services Act), bringing new services and actors within the scope of the accessibility requirements of the Act. Some service-specific additional requirements have also been added to the Act concerning the services within the scope of the Act.
On this page
- New services falling within the scope of the Digital Services Act
- New requirements and obligations of the Digital Services Act
- Legal rights of users and monitoring of accessibility requirements
- Transition period for amendments to the Digital Services Act
- What to do if accessibility requirements cannot be met?
- Useful links
Amendments to the Digital Services Act originate from the EU Accessibility Directive, which has been enforced in Finland since 1 February 2023. The amend-ments promote equality in a digitising society.
This page contains information on the services within the scope of the accessibility requirements of the Digital Services Act from now on, and what types of requirements and obligations apply to these services and their providers. The services must comply with the accessibility requirements of the Digital Services Act after the transition period, from 28 June 2025 onward. Service providers should take the new requirements into consideration well in advance.
New services falling within the scope of the Digital Services Act
The Digital Services Act covers the following services intended for consumers: e‑commerce, e‑books, some passenger and bank services, as well as services and communication services providing access to audiovisual content.
A consumer is a person, not an organisation, that acquires a service or product mainly for purposes other than their business activities.
The Act does not apply to micro-enterprises. A micro-enterprise refers to enterprises with fewer than 10 employees, whose annual turnover does not exceed EUR 2 million or whose annual balance sheet total does not exceed EUR 2 million. However, micro-enterprises are encouraged to provide their services in accordance with accessibility requirements, even if they do not apply to them.
The Digital Services Act will apply to the following new services from 28 June 2025 onward.
New requirements and obligations of the Digital Services Act
The above-mentioned services within the scope of the Digital Services Act must meet the general accessibility requirements and obligations laid down in the Digital Services Act. These requirements are described on the Requirements of the Act on the Provision of Digital Services page (External link).
The Digital Services Act has also been supplemented with additional obligations and service-specific requirements. These only apply to services falling within the scope of the Act from now on. These services must meet both the general accessibility requirements mentioned above, and the service-specific additional requirements and additional obligations related to the accessibility statement as of 28 June 2025. Further provisions on service-specific additional requirements are laid down in the relevant Government Decree (link to the Decree (External link), in Finnish). The following section provides information on new service-specific additional requirements and additional obligations related to the accessibility statement.
Additional obligations related to the accessibility statement
Services within the scope of the Digital Services Act must have an accessibility statement describing the state of accessibility of the service. In addition to the general description, the accessibility statement for services falling within the scope of the Act from now on must include the following information:
- The service provider must provide information on the product needed to use the service
- If the use of a digital service requires the use of a product in order to function, the service provider must also provide information on how the product in question relates to the digital service, what accessibility features it has and how it works with assistive devices and other arrangements that assist the use of the service.
- The service provider must provide information on the fulfilment of additional service-specific requirements
- The service provider shall also publish a description of how additional service-specific requirements concerning the service in question have been taken into account in the service.
More information on the accessibility statement (External link) and how to prepare one is available on the page Information about the accessibility statement. Accessibility monitoring has created a tool to help you prepare a statement. It will be updated to include the amendments to the Digital Services Act before the application of the new accessibility requirements begins.
Legal rights of users and monitoring of accessibility requirements
Users of digital services have exactly the same rights with regard to the accessibility requirements of the Digital Services Act. In other words, the user will also have the right to submit requests for clarification and complaints about accessibility concerning the services and additional requirements falling within the scope of the Act from now on. Read more about user rights on the User rights page (External link).
The Regional State Administrative Agency for Southern Finland also supervises the implementation of accessibility requirements with regard to the digital services covered by the Act from now on and the additional requirements concerning them. More information on the tasks of the supervisory authority (External link).
Transition period for amendments to the Digital Services Act
Services falling within the scope of the Digital Services Act from now on must comply with the accessibility requirements and service-specific additional requirements after the transition period, i.e., from 28 June 2025 onward.
However, if a service agreement concerning a service falling within the scope of the Digital Services Act from now on has been concluded before the end of the transition period on 28 June 2025, the agreement may remain unchanged until the agreement expires. However, the agreement may not be extended unchanged for more than five years from the end of the transitional period.
This also means that as of 28 June 2025, new service agreements will no longer be allowed for services that do not comply with the accessibility requirements and service-specific additional requirements of the Digital Services Act.
The accessibility requirements and additional requirements of the Digital Services Act do not apply to:
- contents of digital services that are archived before 28 June 2025.
- pre-recorded time-based media published before 28 June 2025.
- office file formats in digital services published before 28 June 2025.
What to do if accessibility requirements cannot be met?
Deviation from accessibility requirements for service-specific additional requirements
The service provider may deviate from the accessibility requirements of the Digital Services Act if, based on its accessibility assessment, it can demonstrate that compliance with the accessibility requirements places a disproportionate burden on its digital service. Information about a disproportionate burden is available on the Information about the accessibility statement page (External link):
The service provider may deviate from the additional service-specific requirements added to the Digital Services Act if compliance imposes a disproportionate burden on its digital service or if compliance would fundamentally alter the basic nature of the service.
With regard to additional requirements, the assessment of disproportionate burden shall take into account the following:
- Ratio of the costs of compliance with accessibility requirements to the operational and capital expenditure for the economic operator.
- Ratio of the net costs of compliance with accessibility requirements to the net turnover of the economic operator.
- Cost-to-benefit ratio. When assessing this, particular attention shall be paid to the needs of persons with disabilities to use the service.
A new assessment shall be carried out by the service provider whenever the digital service is changed, when requested by the supervisory authority, or at least every five years. The assessment carried out shall be documented. Documentation must also be kept for five years after the provider has provided the digital service.
However, no exception can be made to the accessibility requirements or additional service-specific requirements if the service provider receives funding granted for improving accessibility, and this funding originates from external public or private sources, not from the service provider’s own resources.
Notification of shortcomings in accessibility
If the digital service does not meet the accessibility requirements, the service provider must inform the supervisory authority of the shortcomings in compliance and how the shortcomings will be rectified.
Accessibility monitoring will later publish more detailed instructions on how to report shortcomings in accessibility.
Useful links
The Act on the Provision of Digital Services (in Finnish) (External link)