According to the World Health Organization (WHO), more than 1.5 billion people (nearly 20% of the global population) live with hearing loss, with 430 million of these having disabling hearing loss. Most of these individuals, particularly those who are prelingually deaf, rely on sign language for communication.
Sign language is crucial for deaf individuals to access most of the information needed for daily life, making it indispensable for their full social integration. For deaf people, sign language is often the first language learned and the preferred way of communication. Sign language is recognized by law in many nations worldwide and should be present in many formal contexts; however, human translators are not enough.
The Computer Architecture Laboratory at the University of Siena, Italy, developed a special encoding technique to integrate Italian Sign Language (LIS) into a larger number of devices. Recent developments involved collaborating with Quest-It, an Italian company specializing in AI solutions, to create an artificial human (displayed as an avatar) able to produce LIS on a web page, making it available in many contexts.