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How to fix: ARIA attribute validity (WCAG 4.1.2 A)

Why this matters

Invalid ARIA roles and attributes are silently ignored by assistive technology — worse than no ARIA at all, because the author thinks they've addressed accessibility. Common typos: aria-labeled-by, role="navigaton". WCAG 4.1.2 Level A applies.

Background

Invalid ARIA roles + attributes are silently ignored by assistive technology — worse than no ARIA at all, because the author thinks they've addressed accessibility. Validate against the WAI-ARIA spec.

References

WCAG 2.1 SC 4.1.2 Name Role Value (A) · WAI-ARIA 1.2 spec

How to fix

Code snippet for each stack we cover. Pick the one matching your server / framework.

nginx

No server config — markup audit.

apache

Same.

cloudflare

Same.

wordpress

Run axe DevTools on key pages. It flags invalid roles and attributes with line numbers.

flask

Run axe-core in CI (https://github.com/dequelabs/axe-core). Add eslint-plugin-jsx-a11y for component frameworks.

express

Same.

rails

Same.

Verify it's working

Run axe DevTools (browser extension) on every key page. Should report 0 invalid ARIA findings.

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