The 'software' that allows 'seeing' television to deafblind people

The GoAll application, free and available for iOS and Android, collects the subtitles and sends them to the user's braille line

    Deafblind people (some 20,000 in Spain alone) have serious communication problems since all the information is received through the interpreter-guide who, through touch, transmits everything to them. To alleviate this problem, Carlos III University of Madrid (UC3M), Telefonica and Fasocide (Federation of Deafblind Associations) have presented PervasiveSUB technology, a pioneering software in the world that allows people who are deafblind. receive and enjoy without intermediaries the contents of television at the same time as the people around them.

Ángel García Crespo, a professor at UC3M and project director, pointed out that this way "all the information that appears on television" can be accessed through the "smartphone". "Something that was previously forbidden for them and now they can enjoy, for example, a movie."

   The PervasiveSUB technology, financed by Telefónica and developed by the research group of the Institute of Technological Development and Promotion of Innovation Pedro Juan de Lastanosa of the Carlos III University, collects all the subtitles of the television channels and sends them to a central server from where they are forwarded to the 'smartphones' or tablets. From there, the information is sent to the braille line of the deafblind person thanks to the GoAll app.

Free and available in Spain

This application, available on iOS and Android, is completely free, it is compatible with different Braille lines and allows you to control the speed of the subtitles captured directly from the television broadcast in perfect direct.

The technology is already available in all the national DTT national and regional channels of Madrid and soon in the rest of the autonomous communities. In the next few months it will be implemented in the United States and, little by little, it will be expanded to more countries.

It is not the first time that Carlos III University of Madrid works on accessibility issues for people are sensory disabilities. "Three years ago, we were pioneers in presenting a technology to make the movie theaters that now work in 500 theaters across the country accessible," recalls García Crespo.