School used student laptop webcams to spy on them at school and home

[The Lawspeaker]

School used student laptop webcams to spy on them at school and home

According to the filings in Blake J Robbins v Lower Merion School District (PA) et al, the laptops issued to high-school students in the well-heeled Philly suburb have webcams that can be covertly activated by the schools' administrators, who have used this facility to spy on students and even their families. The issue came to light when the Robbins's child was disciplined for "improper behavior in his home" and the Vice Principal used a photo taken by the webcam as evidence. The suit is a class action, brought on behalf of all students issued with these machines.

If true, these allegations are about as creepy as they come. I don't know about you, but I often have the laptop in the room while I'm getting dressed, having private discussions with my family, and so on. The idea that a school district would not only spy on its students' clickstreams and emails (bad enough), but also use these machines as AV bugs is purely horrifying.

Schools are in an absolute panic about kids divulging too much online, worried about pedos and marketers and embarrassing photos that will haunt you when you run for office or apply for a job in 10 years. They tell kids to treat their personal details as though they were precious.

your privacy is worthless and you shouldn't try to protect it.
Update: The school district admits that student laptops were shipped with software for covertly activating their webcams, but denies wrongdoing.
Robbins v. Lower Merion School District (PDF) (Thanks, Roland!)


(Image: IMG_6395, a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike image from bionicteaching's photostream)

[Daos]

My notebook has a led that turns on along with the webcam, isn't that standard? At any rate, my internet is to slow for anyone to spy on me. But just in case, I keep the webcam disabled...

[Nordish Persephone]

Now thats creepy. I am officially creeped out by webcams and will never use one.

[Majar]

If true, these allegations are about as creepy as they come. I don't know about you, but I often have the laptop in the room while I'm getting dressed, having private discussions with my family, and so on. The idea that a school district would not only spy on its students' clickstreams and emails (bad enough), but also use these machines as AV bugs is purely horrifying.

Yes. Exactly. What was there to stop a perverted administrator from watching students undress?

The fact that the school knew this spy camera was part of the hardware and used it at all is enough to be outraged over. The school admins should be crucified upside down and pelted with rocks by parents. Do you know what the 'improper behavior' was? The kid was eating candy in his own home.

NBC 10 got an interview with the kid (and his lawyer) at the center of the Lower Merion School District scandal. According to their story, we now know the supposed inappropriate behavior that the School District snapped a photo of, via Blake's Web cam: The district thought they caught him popping pills. Blake Robbins says they were Mike-N-Ike's candies.

The 16-year-old from Penn Valley, Pa. claims Matsko showed him photos remotely taken with the built-in webcam on his MacBook, according to the suit. In the photos, the teen was allegedly holding two pill-shaped objects, says Robbins' attorney Mark Haltzman. School officials believed they were drugs, while the family maintains they were simply Mike-N-Ike candy. "They were trying to allege that…those were pills and somehow he was involved in selling drugs," Halzman said Friday. ~ citypaper.net

[Grey]

So how many students were caught jerking off?