Abstract. Online digital media is becoming the most important arena for general information sharing and public debate. Making this arena accessible to all is essential for equal participation in today's society. However, the accessibility of web-based media services has not been given much attention despite their importance for the democracy of our society. The overall objective for this research is to gain knowledge on universal design of websites containing complex multimedia, in order to ensure equal access for diverse groups operating different devices in various situations. To achieve this objective, we have conducted heuristic evaluations of the news web pages at the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK), the authoring tools for journalists, and focus group interviews on the accessibility of NRK.no. The preliminary results show that although participants expressed general positive attitude towards the design of NRK.no, many accessibility challenges remain to be addressed.