Why accessibility overlay widgets don't actually work (and the FTC just fined one $1M)

You've seen the button. It floats in the corner of websites — a stylized stick figure or a wheelchair icon, sometimes pulsing slightly to attract attention. Click it and a panel pops up offering "accessibility profiles" — increase contrast, larger fonts, dyslexia mode, screen reader mode, content adjustments. These are accessibility overlay widgets. accessiBe, UserWay, AudioEye, EqualWeb, and a handful of smaller vendors all sell variations of the same thing: a JavaScript file you add to your si