School spies on student, busts him for…eating candy

Prototype of the school's proposed catcam 3000

Today fak3r from fak3r.com and Matt from Obtuseview.com are working together to bring you a multi-perspective piece on internet security.  Rarely are team-ups like this seen except in the pages of “Marvel Team-Ups” or “a very Special Episodes of Diff’rnt Strokes.”

So the Pennsylvania school using webcams on district provided laptops to spy on its students story just gets more and more bizarre.  The parents of one of kids is (rightfully) suing the school, “…alleging the district unlawfully used its ability to access a webcam remotely on their son’s district-issued laptop computer [...] it watched him through his laptop’s webcam while he was at home and unaware he was being observed” This is apparently proven when the school “caught” the student engaging in “improper behavior” in his home, via a webcam image.  Meanwhile the school claims it had the ability to observe images via the webcam, but that it would only be used if the laptop were reported to be lost stolen or missing, and even then “…the district would first have to request access from its technology and security department and receive authorization.” Additionally, the school claims this monitoring was all part of an agreement defining “acceptable-use” that the family had to sign to allow the student to take the laptop home, which also states that the family was required to buy insurance for the borrowed laptop.  So far, so ridiculous, but then it starts getting sillier… (more…)

Feb 23, 2010 | Categories: commentary, geek, news, privacy | Tags: aclu, eavesdropping, eff, high school, keylogger, laptop, laptops, online privacy, privacy, students, webcam | View Comments