HIGH SCHOOL-ISSUED LAPTOP WEBCAMS USED TO SPY ON STUDENTS!

[Fat Man]

OK! Now this is the absolute pits!

http://americasright.com/?p=3159

Lawsuit: PA School District Using School-Issued Laptop Webcams
to Spy on Students
February 17, 2010 by Jeff Schreiber
Filed under News & Views

A class action lawsuit filed late yesterday in Federal Court in Philadelphia has shed light on a secret surveillance program targeting Americans, but this particular operation is not being run by the FBI or the NSA. Itâ??s being run by the Lower Merion School District, in the old-money Main Line suburbs of Philadelphia, PA.


The complaint, filed by minor high school student Blake Robbins and his parents, alleges that the school district has been spying on the activities of students and studentsâ?? families through the â??indiscriminant use of and ability to remotely activate the webcams incorporated into each laptop issued to students,â? all without the knowledge or consent of any of the students or parents involved.

Through a one-to-one laptop computer initiative funded by state and federal grants, each of the approximately 1,800 students in the school districtâ??s two high schools, Harriton High School in Rosemont, PA and Lower Merion High School in Ardmore, PA were issued a webcam-equipped personal laptop computer. The initiative, according to remarks by Superintendentâ??and defendantâ??Christopher McGinley on the districtâ??s Web site, â??enhances opportunities for ongoing collaboration, and ensures that all students have 24/7 access to school based resources and the ability to seamlessly work on projects and research at school and at home.â?

What students and parents did not know, however, was that the 24/7 access goes both ways. According to the complaint, nowhere in any of the documentation accompanying the laptops or otherwise disseminated to students and parents was any reference made to the ability of the school district to remotely activate the webcam embedded in each laptop at any time, according to the districtâ??s discretion.

How the capability was discovered should be enough to put any who value civil liberties and privacy on the edge of their seat. From the complaint (emphasis mine):

On November 11, 2009, Plaintiffs were for the first time informed of the above-mentioned capability and practice by the School District when Lindy Matsko, an Assistant Principal at Harriton High School, informed minor Plaintiff that the School District was of the belief that minor Plaintiff was engaged in improper behavior in his home, and cited as evidence a photograph from the webcam embedded in minor Plaintiffâ??s personal laptop issued by the School District.

It was only then that Blake Robbinsâ?? father, Michael, verified from Assistant Principal Lindy Matsko that the school district did in fact have the capability of remotely activating the cameras embedded in the district-issued laptop computer wherever the computer may be situated and regardless of whether the student is using it, and that the school district could at any time choose â??to view and capture whatever images were in front of the webcam, all without the knowledge, permission or authorization of any persons then and there using the laptop computer.â?

The school districtâ??s conduct, the plaintiffs allege, runs afoul of not only the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution, but also a laundry list of federal and state laws intended to protect the privacy of people and stored information alike. This includes the Electronic Communication Privacy Act, the Computer Fraud Abuse Act, the Stored Communications Act, §1983 of the Civil Rights Act, the Pennsylvania Wiretapping and Electronic Surveillance Act, and Pennsylvania common law as well.

In the complaint, the plaintiffs voice concerns as to any students or family members who could have been caught in â??embarrassing and humiliatingâ? situations, noting that â??the laptops at issue were routinely used by students and family members while at home,â? and that â??many of the images captured and intercepted may consist of images of minors and their parents or friends in compromising or embarrassing positions, including, but not limited to, in various stage of dress or undress.â?

Blake Robbins and his parents are represented by Mark Haltzman of Lamm Rubenstone LLC. Class members include any students who have been issued webcam-equipped personal laptop computers by the Lower Merion School District. The plainiffs are seeking punitive and other damages stemming from the school districtâ??s invasion of privacy.

Robbins v. Lower Merion School District, case number 2:10cv00665, was filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on Tuesday, February 16, 2010. Click HERE for a PDF copy of the complaint.

http://americasright.com/wp-content/upl ... bins17.pdf


SEE ALSO:

* Spying School District Responds, Admits to Lack of Notice, Remote Access
* FBI Gets Involved in School Spying Case
* Two Mike & Ikes and One Motion
* Standstill Order Expected in School Spying Case

And here is some more!
http://americasright.com/?p=3208

Spying PA School District Responds, Admits to Lack of
Notice, Remote Access
February 18, 2010 by Jeff Schreiber
Filed under News & Views

Yesterday evening, Americaâ??s Right reported the story of a class action lawsuit filed in Federal Court in Philadelphia alleging that the Lower Merion School District had been spying on students and studentsâ?? families in their own homes through the use of remotely accessible webcams on laptops which had been distributed to each of the districtâ??s 1,800 high school students as part of an initiative funded with state and federal grants.



The plaintiff in the case is Harriton High School student Blake Robbins who, along with his family, first discovered the districtâ??s remote access capability when he was approached by an assistant principal and accused of improper behavior in his own home, with the administratorâ??s only evidence being a snapshot obtained from the laptop webcam.

Now, the school district is responding to the allegations in the Robbins complaint.

A commenter here at Americaâ??s Right claiming to be a Harriton High School student wrote earlier today that, during todayâ??s school day, the school principal â??issued a statement over the P.A. System that denied the claims, and stated that the schoolâ??s tech department has little power to remotely activate the cameras â?? and only utilizes it if a stolen computer is reported (to see if they can find the thief).â? Now, please note that we are still in the process of verifying that the commenter is, in fact, a Harriton High School student, but his account of the administrationâ??s announcement certainly comports with the official statement offered by Lower Merion School District Superintendent Dr. Christopher McGinley on the districtâ??s Web site. The statement:

Dear LMSD Community,

Last year, our district became one of the first school systems in the United States to provide laptop computers to all high school students. This initiative has been well received and has provided educational benefits to our students.

The District is dedicated to protecting and promoting student privacy. The laptops do contain a security feature intended to track lost, stolen and missing laptops. This feature has been deactivated effective today.

The following questions and answers help explain the background behind the initial decision to install the tracking-security feature, its limited use, and next steps.

â?¢ Why are webcams installed on student laptops?

The Apple computers that the District provides to students come equipped with webcams and students are free to utilize this feature for educational purposes.

â?¢ Why was the remote tracking-security feature installed?

Laptops are a frequent target for theft in schools and off school property. The security feature was installed to help locate a laptop in the event it was reported lost, missing or stolen so that the laptop could be returned to the student.

â?¢ How did the security feature work?

Upon a report of a suspected lost, stolen or missing laptop, the feature was activated by the Districtâ??s security and technology departments. The tracking-security feature was limited to taking a still image of the operator and the operatorâ??s screen. This feature has only been used for the limited purpose of locating a lost, stolen or missing laptop. The District has not used the tracking feature or web cam for any other purpose or in any other manner whatsoever.

â?¢ Do you anticipate reactivating the tracking-security feature?

Not without express written notification to all students and families.

We regret if this situation has caused any concern or inconvenience among our students and families. We are reviewing the matter and will provide an additional update as soon as information becomes available.

Sincerely,

Dr. Christopher McGinley

Superintendent

Before tearing the statement apart, piece by piece, I should point out that I have no problem whatsoever with an initiative providing laptop computers to students. Granted, I would prefer that state and federal grants not be used, and I would certainly prefer that the technology not include remotely accessible webcams, but the idea itself is just fine. I believe wholeheartedly in a free market approach to education with minimal (if any) federal involvement, the idea being akin to Ronald Reaganâ??s comparison of federalism with a â??thousand sparks of geniusâ? in all of the states and communities which should be nurtured in order to see which ones catch fire â?? if certain school districts have success with various initiatives and programs, that laboratory of sorts will allow other school districts to pursue the same success.

Therefore, if a laptop-centric approach to education works for Lower Merion, which along with nearby Radnor Township School District are certainly among the best in the state, more power to them. Where the school district went wrong, however, was in creating a vehicle for a tremendous abuse of power and violation of constitutional rights, not to mention state and federal law.

And a violation it certainly was. Even for folks like myself who do not read an actual right to privacy into the Constitution, this was an overt violation of the Fourth Amendment as it was written and intended. Obviously, James Madison and his friends knew nothing of e-mail, webcams or MacBooks, but it is important to note that in drafting our founding documents the framers knew less of what they wanted America to become and more of what they did not want their great experiment to descend into. The Fourth Amendment was largely written in response to pre-Revolution warrantless searches of colonistsâ?? homes by British soldiers searching for tax stamps and signs of smuggling, a necessary evil in the mercantilist economy at the time.

If we are to believe the allegations put forth by Blake Robbins in the class action complaint filed late Tuesday, the incident which alerted Robbins and his family to the school districtâ??s remote-access capabilities featured an overreaching school district peering into private homes without notice or consent, all in search of â??improper behaviorâ? of the sort that Robbins was confronted with.

Furthermore, in the statement released a few hours ago, Lower Merion School District not only admits to the existence of the remote access capability (â??the laptops do contain a security feature intended to track lost, stolen and missing laptopsâ?) which had indeed been active (â??this feature has been deactivated effective todayâ?), but also admits to exactly who has the discretion to activate the feature (â??the feature was activated by the Districtâ??s security and technology departmentsâ?) and comes clean on the lack of student or parental notification alleged by Robbins in the complaint:

â?¢ Do you anticipate reactivating the tracking-security feature?

Not without express written notification to all students and families.

The mere existence and activation of the remote access capability, which Lower Merion School District admits to in the statement by Superintendent McGinley, means that the district is in possession of and has made use of an â??electronic, mechanical or other deviceâ? through which, by taking a picture of Blake Robbins in his own home, it has intercepted electronic communications in the form of imaging and other data in violation of Sections 2510 and 2511 of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act.

More over, that the school district has admitted to its capacity to conjure up such images at the discretion of its security and technology departments means that the districtâ??s conduct was not only unlawful but also was done consciously and intentionally, which could make Blake Robbins and the other students eligible for punitive damages under Section 2520 of the ECPA.

Furthermore, if it is to be determined that Lower Merion School District activated the remote access to the district-issued laptop computers without notice or consent of students and parents, as the school district certain seems to admit to in its statement, then the school administrators have also run afoul of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, Section 1030 of which notes that â??whoever â?¦ intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized accessâ? and obtains information shall be subject to punishment. Certainly, remote activation of a webcam in someoneâ??s private home without consent constitutes â??exceeds authorized access,â? especially considering the United States Supreme Courtâ??s holding in 1980â??s Payton v. New York that â??absent exigent circumstances,â? when it comes to unreasonable search the Fourth Amendment â??has drawn a firm line at the entrance to the house.â?

At least, thatâ??s the way I see it. Obviously, there are going to be other perspectives and, truthfully, many will come from folks far better versed in statutory interpretation than I. The Fourth Amendment violation, in my opinion, is pretty darned clear â?? what is not clear is how the court will interpret the various terms, provisions and other language in the relevant sections of the ECPA and CFAA and the other laws the school district allegedly violated.

What comes next though, especially with regard to public opinion, is the matter of scope. In other words, just how far was this overreaching school district reaching? If we are to believe the purported student who left a comment here at Americaâ??s Right, it seems as though school officials did not limit the discretionary activation of the security feature to concerns of lost and stolen laptops. The comment again, in full (emphasis mine):

To all the people that say that this isnâ??t real, it is. It definitely is. I am a student at Harriton High School (the school of two in the district where this took place) and just today our principal issued a statement over the P.A. System that denied the claims, and stated that the schoolâ??s tech department has little power to remotely activate the cameras â?? and only utilizes it if a stolen computer is reported (to see if they can find the thief). However, I donâ??t believe that for two seconds. If anybody here owns a Mac, you know that a green light turns on when the camera is in use. I can personally attest to that light turning on at a time when I was at home.

As a dad myself, I can say unequivocally that all of this should be enough to make any parentâ??not to mention any American who values individual freedom and liberty or any human who values privacyâ??shudder, shut off and unplug all electronic devices, and hold their children close.

As a law student who hopes to pass the bar and find a job down in Charleston, SC by the end of this summer, I cannot wait to see the answer filed by the Lower Merion School District. Especially interesting will be the paragraph-by-paragraph responses to the allegations and specific statutory violations touched upon above, and how those responses compare with what I see as some interesting admissions in the statement issued not so long ago. Undoubtedly, itâ??s going to be a matter of statutory interpretation, but I must say that absent some sort of impropriety among the complaining parties the overarching theme here will make for an uphill climb for the school district. Stay tuned here at Americaâ??s Right for details as they emerge.

And more.
http://americasright.com/?p=3227

FBI Gets Involved in School Spying Case
February 19, 2010 by Jeff Schreiber
Filed under News & Views

According to the Associated Press, by way of the local Philadelphia ABC affiliate, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has tossed its hat into the ring with regard to Lower Merion School Districtâ??s alleged surveillance of students in their own homes by way of remote access to webcam-equipped laptop computers issued by the districtâ??s two high schools to all 1,800 high school students.



The story was first reported here at Americaâ??s Right back on Wednesday evening, one day after a class action lawsuit was filed in federal court in Philadelphia. It has since taken on a life of its own; the news that the FBI is becoming involved is a new, but not wholly unexpected, twist. The AP account:

A law-enforcement official with knowledge of the case says the FBI has opened a criminal investigation into a Pennsylvania school district accused of activating webcams inside studentsâ?? homes without their knowledge.

The official, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, says the FBI will explore whether Lower Merion School District officials broke any federal wiretap or computer-intrusion laws.

Iâ??m no expert on FBI procedure, but I would imagine that the constitutional issues combined with the wiretap-related allegations puts this case right in their wheelhouse. The AP piece also notes that the Montgomery County district attorneyâ??s office is looking into a possible investigation. If I were a betting man, Iâ??d say that national scrutiny alone will be enough to force their hand.

By far, though, the most interesting part of the AP story which noted that school district officials admitted to remotely activating the laptop webcams 42 times to find missing student laptops over a period of the past 14 months, but that at no time did anyone use the capability to spy on students.

Such a statement doesnâ??t jive, however, with the account by Blake Robbinsâ??the Harriton High School student who filed the complaintâ??about how he and his family first discovered the remote access capability. From the complaint (emphasis mine):

On November 11, 2009, Plaintiffs were for the first time informed of the above-mentioned capability and practice by the School District when Lindy Matsko, an Assistant Principal at Harriton High School, informed minor Plaintiff that the School District was of the belief that minor Plaintiff was engaged in improper behavior in his home, and cited as evidence a photograph from the webcam embedded in minor Plaintiffâ??s personal laptop issued by the School District.

The statements made by the school district so far are all well and good, as is the laptop computing initiative itself (though, as I said before, Iâ??d rather the state and federal funding not have been used), but again itâ??s a matter of how the initiative was carried out by administrators. The laptops did indeed have the remote access capability, neither parents nor students were apprised of the capability, and the remote access was admittedly used without student or parental notice or consent. And, at the end of the day and any way you look at it, what we saw here was an administration overreaching its very limited authority, infringing studentsâ?? and familiesâ?? Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable search and seizure in the process.

I look forward to seeing how things progress, and whether Lower Merion School Districtâ??s story changes as federal and county authorities close in on technology department records. I look forward in particular to seeing the pleadings as they are filed by all parties. The districtâ??s response to the plaintiffâ??s requests for admissions alone will be very interesting. Even at the level the district is admitting to, remotely accessing web cameras on 42 separate occasions, there should be some severe consequences for all parties involved.

Parents should be outraged. Students have every right to feel violated. And every American who may have been concerned about â??big brotherâ? but considered issues like the remote activation of webcams a little too close to the tin-foil-hat crowd should stand up and take notice. Lower Merion School District, looking down from a position of relative authority, did not trust students and parents enough to take care of school laptops on their own enough to even apprise them of the remote access capability and provide them with an option to turn it off â?? at a time when the federal government is looking to get intimately involved in all aspects of daily life, from health care to energy to the college football postseason, this story is even more relevant than it seems.

Oh! This just keeps on getting better!
http://americasright.com/?p=3237

Two Mike & Ikes and One Motion
February 20, 2010 by Jeff Schreiber
Filed under News & Views

If it werenâ??t so gosh-darned serious, it would be funny.

On the late local NBC news following the Vancouver Olympics about an hour ago (Friday night), reporters interviewed Blake Robbins and his family, the folks at the center of the class action lawsuit filed against a Main Line school district which had been allegedly spying on students in their own homes through remote access to webcam-enabled, school-issued laptop computers, a story first reported here on Wednedday.

The NBC reporter also interviewed Mark Haltzman, the familyâ??s attorney. Harriton High School student Blake Robbins, remember, only found out about the school districts remote access capabilities when an assistant principal approached him with a snapshot taken from Robbinsâ?? school-issued laptop and, according to what the kid said in a CBS Evening News interview, accused him of dealing drugs. That â??improper behavior,â? Haltzman said, was Blake Robbins holding a pair of Mike & Ike candies, apparently one of the kidâ??s favorite snacks.



As I said, if it werenâ??t so serious, if the as-yet-unknown scope of the school districtâ??s unconstitutional and unconscionable conduct didnâ??t worry students and parents who routinely had the computers set up in bedrooms and other sensitive areas within their own homes, the whole thing would be hilarious.

Haltzman, by the way, also confirmed that at no time was Blake Robbinsâ?? laptop computer reported lost or stolen. This, of course, undermines repeated statements made by Lower Merion School District that the studentsâ?? webcams were only activated in cases when the laptops were reported lost or stolen. It also confirms what one commenter here at Americaâ??s Rightâ??who held himself out as a Harriton studentâ??wrote on Thursday, that he had noticed the green light on his own district-issued laptop illuminate arbitrarily from time to time while the computer was set up at home.

The story has been all over the news here in the Philadelphia area, but news coverage isnâ??t the only new twist in this story. As the Associated Press reported earlier, the FBI has become involved, as has the Montgomery County district attorneyâ??s office. Furthermore, Haltzman filed a Motion for issuance of an Emergency Temporary Restraining Order and imposition of Permanent Injunction in federal court Friday afternoon asking that the court enjoin Lower Merion School District from any further use of the remote webcam access â??security feature.â?

The district, of course, said in a statement on Thursday that the feature had already been disabled as of that day but, then again, theyâ??ve also insisted that the feature was only used in cases of suspected loss or theft â?? and considering the comments regarding arbitrarily brightening green lights in studentsâ?? homes, the districtâ??s credibility seems to be sinking faster than the balance in Tiger Woodsâ?? joint checking account.

Think about it for a moment, though. Educators generally tend to lean to the left, and an overarching perspective among those on the American political left is that government knows better than the individual, that schools can parent better than parents â?? is it really so far-fetched to consider that the administration was policing its own students looking for wrongdoing (or fruity candy proliferation in a pinch)? Or, if not that, is it really far-fetched to think that the administration at the very least did not have an adequate grasp on the number or type of people able to wield this power of omnipresence?

Whatever your thoughts, the full text of the motion is available by clicking HERE.
http://americasright.com/wp-content/upl ... n-2-19.pdf
But I thought Iâ??d include a few highlights.

Since the filing of Plaintiffsâ?? Class Action Complaint, Defendants have admitted that the lap top computers issued to all high school students in the Lower Merion School District contain software which enables Defendants to remotely activate web cams embedded in the lap tops. A true and correct copy of the email sent to all the students and parents on February 18, 2010, all members of the proposed class of Plaintiffs, as well as the statement that appears on the Defendant School Districtâ??s website are collectively attached hereto as Exhibit â??Bâ? and speak for themselves as to Defendantâ??s admissions.

Want to see Exhibit B? Click HERE. http://americasright.com/wp-content/upl ... B-2-19.pdf

As for the statement, I first read it during a break from class on Thursday evening and I was flabbergasted. I was amazed that the district essentially admitted to everything, almost down the line, only a little more than 48 hours after the complaint was filed and 24 hours after the story was first reported here at Americaâ??s Right.

That information is covered in Thursday eveningâ??s piece, seen HERE. http://americasright.com/?p=3208

The attached exhibits coupled with statements provided by Defendants to the media establish that Defendants have the ability to activate the peeping tom technology by use of an embedded camera in every laptop for the purpose of using such peeping tom technology to take a snap shot of what is appearing in front of the webcam and what is on the laptop computer screen.

Moreover, the Defendants admit it has the ability to unilaterally, arbitrarily and capriciously activate and deactivate the camera and software that is utilized to accomplish this invasion of privacy.

Additionally, notwithstanding Defendantsâ?? public pronouncement in response to Plaintiffsâ?? institution of their class action that the embedded camera was only activated to and employed to investigate lost or stolen laptops, a number of the affected class members were interview by various news media outlets yesterday, which interviews reveal that the embedded web camera was turned on indiscriminately by Defendants as evidenced by the illumination of a small green light adjacent to the camera that indicated its activation, as has been reported by a number of members of the class.

That last paragraph is the killer, in my opinion. It seems as though the many news reports Iâ??ve seen and read have focused on the spying and the technology but not on the most important facet of it all: Blake Robbins was in his own home, using his own district-issued laptopâ??which hadnâ??t been reported as either lost or stolenâ??when his laptopâ??s webcam was accessed without consent or authorization, his picture was taken, and it was later used against him by school administrators who insinuated that he was involved in â??improper behavior.â?

Imagine if those Mike & Ikes were Good Nâ?? Plentys or that powdery fun-dip stuff. Or if, God forbid, he had been tweaking the optics attached to an air rifle.

That the school district is capturing images of students at home, and that more students are coming forward and saying that their green lights, too, had been illuminated from time to time â?? thatâ??s the hook. I could see the depositions right now:

Attorney: So, Tiffani, youâ??re a junior at Lower Merion High School, yes?

Tiffani: Yes.

Attorney: And how old are you?

Tiffani: Iâ??m fifteen.

Attorney: Do you have a MacBook that was issued by Lower Merion School District?

Tiffani: Yes I do.

Attorney: Did you ever notice the green light which indicates the camera is active illuminated when you werenâ??t using the camera yourself?

Tiffani: Yes, I have noticed it.

Attorney: And where do you usually keep the laptop, Tiffani?

Tiffani: In my bedroom.

Attorney: You know, I have a daughter about your age who is absolutely obsessed with Facebook. It seems like our computer is always on and always open to Facebook so she doesnâ??t miss any messages from her friends. Did you usually keep your laptop on?

Tiffani: Oh, yes. Iâ??m always on Facebook, too. Itâ??s, like, so cool.

Attorney: And so it wouldnâ??t be out-of-the-question to guess that your laptop was likely in your bedroom and on at times when you were changing to go to school, or changing into your pyjamas at night?

Tiffani: No, not at all. Itâ??s, like, literally on all the time.

Think itâ??s far-fetched? Consider the case of Savannah Williams, who told the CBS Early Show that her school-issued webcam-equipped laptop computer is on all the time, including at times when the Harriton High School sophomore is doing homework and getting changed. She even brings the laptop into the bathroom with her to listen to music while showering.

â??Everyone is talking about it at school,â? Williams told CBS. â??Everyone was really worried about â??what are they watching me doing?â??â?

Haltzman, in the motion filed late yesterday afternoon, doesnâ??t miss the point like many of the news outlets have. In noting that â??even the use of the peeping tom technology for the after-the-fact justification recited by defendants [stolen laptop recovery] still violates the Plaintiffsâ?? constitutional rights, especially when there clearly exists a less intrusive technology that could have been employed to accomplish the same result,â? heâ??s right on the money with the overt violation of constitutional rights here, not to mention the real emotional impact of such an invasion of privacy of these kids.

The motion also contains the reasons behind the decision to seek a temporary restraining order and injunctive relief. The first reason has to do with the aforementioned credibility gap and concerns that despite language to the contrary, â??there can be no assurances that the School District will disable the use of the remote webcam or, once deactivated, make an internal decision to reactivate the webcam. The second reason has to do with something far more sinister:

Moreover, Plaintiff has been informed and believes that Defendants intend to reclaim each laptop from the possession of members of the class for the purpose of wiping clean the hard drive or otherwise engaging in the spoliation of evidence.

Chew on that one for a while. I have studying to do.

And some more.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/04/webcamscanda/

School District Allegedly Snapped Thousands of Student
Webcam Spy Pics

By David Kravets Email Author
April 16, 2010 | 7:12 pm

A webcam spying scandal at a suburban Philadelphia school district is broadening, with lawyers claiming the district secretly snapped thousands of webcam images of students using school-issued laptops without the pupilsâ?? knowledge or consent.

Some of the images included pictures of youths at home, in bed or even â??partially dressed,â? according to a Thursday filing in the case. Pupilsâ?? online chats were also captured, as well as a record of the websites they visited.


Pennsylvania high school officials are accused of spying on students
with webcams on district-issued Macbooks. Here is sophomore
Blake Robbins sleeping at home in an image secretly and allegedly
taken by his school's laptop.
(Posted here with permission of Robbins' attorneys)

When the story first broke in February, the district said the cameras were activated only handful of times when a laptop was reported stolen or missing â?? an assertion lawyers suing the district say is false.

â??Discovery to date has now revealed that thousands of webcam pictures and screen shots (.pdf) have been taken from numerous other students in their homes, many of which never reported their laptops lost or missing,â? attorney Mark Haltzman wrote in a Thursday federal court filing.

In February, the Lower Merion School District deactivated the webcam-tracking program secretly lodged on 2,300 student laptops.

The move came a day after the 6,900-pupil district, which provides students from its two high schools free MacBooks, was sued in federal court on allegations it was undertaking a dragnet surveillance program targeting its students â?? an allegation the district has repeatedly denied.

The suit was based on a claim by sophomore Blake Robbins that school officials reprimanded him for â??improper behaviorâ? based on photos the computer secretly took of the boy at home last fall. One picture shows him asleep at home in October.

That â??behaviorâ? turned out to be pill popping. The family said their son was eating Mike and Ike candy.

Thursdayâ??s filing, which claims 400 images of Robbins were taken during a two-week period last fall, also says that an IT administrator at the district â??may be a voyeur.â? Lawyers suing the district are urging a federal judge presiding over the case to grant a forensic examination of administratorâ??s personal computer.

The lawsuit said the administrator, who has been placed on paid leave, â??invokes the Fifth Amendment to every question asked of her, including a question asked as to whether she had ever downloading (sic) pictures to her own computer, including pictures of students who were naked while in their home.â?

The lawsuit seeks class-action status to represent all the districtâ??s 2,300 high school students.

Proposed legislation announced late Thursday by Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pennsylvania) would make it a federal felony to remotely spy on private residences and hotel rooms with video cameras.

OH YES! OH YES! OH YES INDEED!

America just keeps on getting better and better all the time! Doesn't it?

So, some kid gets busted for "using drugs" when the webcam (or should I say spycam?) sees him eating some candy, some Mike & Ikes!

http://reason.com/blog/2010/02/20/lower ... l-district

Lower Pervian School District vs. Mike and Ikes
Tim Cavanaugh | February 20, 2010

Boing Boing has been following the lawsuit Blake J. Robbins v. Lower Merion School District, a class action [pdf] brought by the parents of a boy who was secretly photographed in his home by a remotely enabled webcam in a laptop issued to him by a Pennsylvania school district. The school district has distributed about 1,800 laptops with remote-access webcams and spyware installed, though the extent of its peeping on students in their homes is not known.



AP reports the FBI is investigating the school district's webcam program, and district spokesman Doug Young suggests without claiming that Harriton High School student Blake J. Robbins' webcam was activated only because the laptop had been reported stolen -- in accordance with an established policy. The boy was charged with an undisclosed infraction based on an image the school picked up from his webcam. District superintendent Christopher W. McGinley, in an orotund statement, defends the program while canceling it. And just to make clear that we're still in high school, Master Robbins appears to have gotten in trouble when he was photographed eating Mike and Ikes.

Robbins' attorney says the reported-stolen claim is bogus. The Wiki page is the best place to follow the unfolding story.

I'm predisposed to think the plaintiffs have a strong case with regard to privacy, informed consent, and the other issues here, but mostly I am tarnaciously thunderstruck by McGinley's simple lack of judgment. I don't remember the Lower Merion kids of a generation ago as being balls of fire, so maybe they have become lawless enough to need constant surveillence these days. (Though I don't understand why a school would even want to be taking responsibility for kids at home, when teachers already bellyache about how hard it is to have responsibility for them during school hours.)

But the country is so crazed by child porn it's willing to prosecute children as child pornographers. McGinley's approval of the webcam program (which the district says was administered by two employees) is appallingly careless management. You could get your mom and dad, or your mom and your mom's boyfriend, or whoever the two people are you trust the most, and put them in charge of this program, but only after requiring them to convert to Mormonism and obtain Cheyenne Mountain security clearances, and I can guarantee you: There would be actionable jailbait images on your server by third period. I hope the FBI gets a good look.

Unrelated language moment: The suit contains repeat occurences of a typo -- indiscriminant, presumably for indiscriminate -- which, with its suggestion of the gerundive, strikes me as better than the correct word. I'm upgrading it from a typo to a neologism.

And here's more!
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/02/22/la ... gle+Reader

Laptop surveillance kid was disciplined when
spying authorities mistook candies for pills
By Cory Doctorow at 1:13 PM February 22, 2010

According to the lawyer for the family of the boy whose school spied on him at home through a covert webcam application on his laptop, the boy was disciplined for eating candies that bear a passing resemblance to pills.

The Lower Merion School District has admitted that the laptops it distributed to students were configured so that administrators could activate their webcams without alerting the user, but insists that the spying capability was only used to help find stolen laptops.

However, the lawyer for the Robbins family says that their son was called into the vice-principal's office and confronted with a photo secretly snapped by his laptop's webcam while he was eating Mike & Ike's candy, and he was accused of taking drugs.



The boy was charged with an undisclosed infraction based on an image the school picked up from his webcam. District superintendent Christopher W. McGinley, in an orotund statement, defends the program while canceling it. And just to make clear that we're still in high school, Master Robbins appears to have gotten in trouble when he was photographed eating Mike and Ikes.

Yeah! Some kid gets busted because the spycam caught him eating some candy in the (privacy?) of his own bedroom.



OK! I guess these would look like some kind of pills as imaged by a spycam!

Oh wait! Now I understand! They're busting kids for eating candy because we have to fight the Great Obesity Epidemic you know! Now I get it!!!

Then the spycam watches as a fifteen your old girl changes her clothes in her own room or watching her as she takes a shower!

Yeah! The USA is becoming more and more of a Pedophile's Paradise!!!

Our schools won't do anything to stop the bullying of good students (the nerds and geeks) by the jocks! In fact, such bullying is often encouraged by athletic coaches in our schools.

So, jocks go unpunished for bullying the other kids around.

But some kid gets busted for eating candy, at home!!!

And now, our schools are run by pedo-pervs who get their rocks off watching teenagers undressing in their own bedrooms or taking showers.

Yeah! Way to go America!!! Don't ya just love it!?!

I'm soooooooooo fucking glad I'm not a kid going to school these days.

If I found out that my school principal was spying on me through a school issued laptop with a webcam and was watching me as I was getting undressed in my own bedroom, well . . . . . I would take a gun with me to school, then I would barge into the principal's office, and stick the fucking gun up his nose and keep pulling the trigger until it didn't work anymore!

Those perverts who run that high school should be executed!



Yeah, I know I have posted these pics dozens of times before.



And again, and again, and again I say . . . every family with children should keep one of these handy dandy spray-cans around.



An UZI, made in Israel.

It's Kosher!

[i_like_1981]

This is disturbing news and one of the reasons why I'm losing faith in the modern technology. There was more privacy back around the time us adult members of the board were born; computer technology was so much more primitive back then and therefore harder to harness for more tyrannical purposes. People had more freedom then in life. Nowadays everyone can be watched or monitored in some way or another. IP tracking on the internet, webcams, all that stuff is being manipulated for the wrong purposes. I get the horrible feeling that one day, George Orwell's dystopian novel "Nineteen Eighty-Four" shall be realised. It's okay for shops to use CCTV to protect their products and staff from low-life robbers and general thugs and aid in the solution of crimes. But when schools use CCTV in private places like changing rooms where young students really don't need to be watched, it borders on invasion of privacy, privacy which everybody needs once in a while. How can you be a free person if you're being watched for everything you do? We're not living in Nazi Germany. Although there are some people who would like that to happen again; some people out there are just distrustful, can't stand criticism, can't let people have their privacy and freedom of speech rights - people like that should not be allowed to have any power as they'll only end up abusing it. This sort of stuff was not a problem when I was at school, but I shall expect it to become more and more of a problem in more schools as technology gets smaller and more powerful. The future shall indeed bring its problems.

Best regards,
i_like_1981

[Earl]

If I found out that my school principal was spying on me through a school issued laptop with a webcam and was watching me as I was getting undressed in my own bedroom, well . . . . . I would take a gun with me to school, then I would barge into the principal's office, and stick the fucking gun up his nose and keep pulling the trigger until it didn't work anymore!

Those perverts who run that high school should be executed!

In real life, if you were a high-school student and you actually reacted this way, you would be prosecuted and convicted for committing murder. I admit that I haven't read your entire post yet, but I must speak out against irresponsible rhetoric. This website does not condone violence of any sort. I certainly will not deny that this country faces very serious problems, but violence is not the solution. Yes, anger is justified; and it's very easy to rant on the Internet. I've done it myself. But words do have consequences. We tend to forget that our words and actions do influence others. This is the sort of statement that has gotten you in trouble before. What is truly sad is that these comments give a totally wrong impression of you. I know that you would never harm a single human being.

Edit: I've just started reading your post in its entirety. As a former high-school teacher, Mrs. Earl has even requested that I read it to her. These allegations are extremely troubling. Webcam images can be misleading. Spying in people's homes is a hallmark of totalitarian rule. So, I must thank you for calling this disturbing development to our attention.

[Fat Man]

If I found out that my school principal was spying on me through a school issued laptop with a webcam and was watching me as I was getting undressed in my own bedroom, well . . . . . I would take a gun with me to school, then I would barge into the principal's office, and stick the fucking gun up his nose and keep pulling the trigger until it didn't work anymore!

Those perverts who run that high school should be executed!

In real life, if you were a high-school student and you actually reacted this way, you would be prosecuted and convicted for committing murder. I admit that I haven't read your entire post yet, but I must speak out against irresponsible rhetoric. This website does not condone violence of any sort. I certainly will not deny that this country faces very serious problems, but violence is not the solution. Yes, anger is justified; and it's very easy to rant on the Internet. I've done it myself. But words do have consequences. We tend to forget that our words and actions do influence others. This is the sort of statement that has gotten you in trouble before. What is truly sad is that these comments give a totally wrong impression of you. I know that you would never harm a single human being . . . . . etc. etc.

Well, I would certainly feel angry enough to want to. I probably wouldn't actually do it, but I would want to do it.

How about if I went into the principal's office with just a switch blade knife and slashed across his eyeballs and blinded him permanently so that he wouldn't be able to watch naked kids taking showers on his spycam, and take a baseball bat to his testicles so that we would not be able to fuck teenage kids anymore?

Another words . . . keep the son-a-bitch alive so he can . . . . .

SUFFER!!!

Yeah! Now that would be a lot more fun!

MMMMMUUUUUUUAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

[Skul]

You do realise you just made yourself sound like a sadistic psychopath, right?

[Fat Man]

You do realise you just made yourself sound like a sadistic psychopath, right?

OK! I was just kidding around.

But I can dream! Can't I?

[Earl]

It's not such a good idea to fantasize on the Internet. Anyone can read it.

[Fat Man]

Well, having been a rape victim myself when I was 17 years old, I feel justified when I fantasize about some pedo-pervo scumbag getting dragged through cactus patches, or thrown off a cliff, or thrown into a pond full of crocogators and allidiles, or down 12 flights of stairs.

No, I have a better one.

How about if the principal had a very long accident, like tumbling down an UP escalator for a few hours before a building maintenance man finally comes to turn it off.

[Earl]

It's possible that the principal was not even aware of what the assistant principal had done. In other words, he may not have authorized any surveillance. And instead of having sinister motives, the assistant principal may have been wrongheaded but well-meaning in trying to spot any troublesome behavior by students enrolled at the school that needed to be addressed. (Not that there was any justification for violating the privacy of the plaintiffs or anyone else.) The point is that you should not make assumptions about the guilt of any particular individual in this case or assume that the school authorities were just a bunch of perverts.

[Fat Man]

It's possible that the principal was not even aware of what the assistant principal had done. In other words, he may not have authorized any surveillance. And instead of having sinister motives, the assistant principal may have been wrongheaded but well-meaning in trying to spot any troublesome behavior by students enrolled at the school that needed to be addressed. (Not that there was any justification for violating the privacy of the plaintiffs or anyone else.) The point is that you should not make assumptions about the guilt of any particular individual in this case or assume that the school authorities were just a bunch of perverts.

Good evening Earl.

Well, the original deal was that the webcams were to be remotely accessed only in the event that a laptop came up missing or stolen, then, and only then, is the remote access to a particular laptop webcam was to be activated in order to track that missing laptop.

That was the original deal.

Also, as for trying to spot troublesome behavior by any students . . . . . since when is it their business to track students when they're at home???

Now, the teachers and the principal, or assistant principal do have a right to deal with any disciplinary problems within the school.

But once the kids are at home, then it's the parents' job to discipline their kids.

So, the principal, or assistant principal do not have any right to track student behavior once the kids are out of the school and at home.

Also, anybody with an ounce of brains, knows that when you start activating student webcams at random, that you're quite literally going to catch some kids with their pants down.

And so . . . in conclusion . . .

(1) Either the assistant principle was a total idiot!

(2) Or he was a pervert who was looking for a chance to spy on kids and take their pictures while they were getting undressed to go to bed or to take a shower.

I would say it was the latter and not the former.

Actually, I would say that he is both and idiot and a pervert!

And the rest of the members of the school board are also idiots and perverts, because NOT one person among them raised any objections to the webcams being remotely activated at random when they only should have been activated in the event that a laptop was missing or stolen. Then, and only then!

Also, there are other ways to track the laptops, other than webcams.

There is audio tracking, or GPS Global Positioning Satellite tracking.

Of course, with audio tracking you might pick up on private conversations, which is bad enough, but not as bad as video tracking where you might see some kid undressed. But then, any kind of tracking is to be done only if a laptop is reported missing or stolen.

No, the assistant principle was not merely "wrongheaded but well-meaning", but rather, a fuckhead who acted intentionally, because he is a peeping Tom pedophile who should be castrated and executed!

As for the rest of the school board, the same applies to them as well.

Talk about guilt by association and all that.

My dearly departed mother had a saying . . . . .

If you lay down with dogs, you'll get up with fleas!

And as we also all know . . . . .

The road to Hell is often paved with good intentions.

[sparkle]

I can't take it anymore. Not everything is about being against fat people. I read this in the paper and the kid wasn't even fat. They thought it was drugs. If they busted a jock u would be happy and u would say, "Oh, it's drugs and they are trying to cover it."

I don't even speak English as a first language, but the word "voyeur" is not always meaning like a pervert.

I don't hate u, Fat Man, but I sometimes hate the things u say. Bad things happen to people and they don't allow it to make them become small, weak, hateful people. Don't let that happen to you. You carry that hate around and it will eat u alive like cancer.

[Fat Man]

I can't take it anymore. Not everything is about being against fat people. I read this in the paper and the kid wasn't even fat. They thought it was drugs. If they busted a jock u would be happy and u would say, "Oh, it's drugs and they are trying to cover it."

I don't even speak English as a first language, but the word "voyeur" is not always meaning like a pervert.

I don't hate u, Fat Man, but I sometimes hate the things u say. Bad things happen to people and they don't allow it to make them become small, weak, hateful people. Don't let that happen to you. You carry that hate around and it will eat u alive like cancer.

Yeah, I know that the kid busted for eating candy wasn't fat.

I was only being sarcastic when I said it was part of fighting the obesity epidemic. OK?

Also, if you can't take it anymore, then why do you keep reading my posts?

Everybody here knows that I'm one of the most outspoken critics when it come to sports or political issues, and yes, I admit, sometime I do get too radical in expressing my view. But then, I do have a lot of anger issues I have to deal with, and the recent harassment from the SPAMmers and the zoo-tramps from 4chan only helped to add more fuel to the fire.

So, I'm really not a very happy camper right now, and I'm overwhelmed with what's going on in this country these days. We are losing our basic civil liberties, more and more with each passing year.

I get so angry I just want to scream sometimes!

Anyway, your missing the whole point of the story.

It's about invasion of privacy, and about how an entire school board lies like a wet rug in their denials.

The webcam on any laptop was to be remotely activated only when that particular laptop was reported as missing or stolen.

But they either had the webcams going all the time, or they were remotely activated at random.

They're are other ways to track a laptop other than the remote activation of a web cam. The school board just use the webcam idea as an excuse so some pervos can get their rocks off spying on kids getting undressed or taking showers, so they had the webcams on most of the time.

You damn right I feel hate!!!

When I was 17 years old, I was beaten and raped, and one never gets completely over it.

So, I hate pedophiles with the purplest of passions.

[HugeFanOfBadReligion]

I think I heard about this a while ago, unless this is a new case with a different school. I also remember a similar case, although I'm not sure if those were laptops or desktop computers in a school computer lab. I find it sickening that they would watch kids in their own homes, in a place that is uninvolved with school. The person responsible needs to be punished and put in prison. It doesn't matter if his intention was to watch the kids undress or just to track missing laptops, if he turn the camera on at random times, he's going to see things that the students don't want him to see. I don't know if anyone has noticed, but cameras are becoming more and more common. It's a great thing for people to protect property by using security cameras, but now I'm noticing that they are everywhere, and soon they're going to be in places that we would consider to be an absurd place to put a camera today.

[Fat Man]

I think I heard about this a while ago, unless this is a new case with a different school. I also remember a similar case, although I'm not sure if those were laptops or desktop computers in a school computer lab. I find it sickening that they would watch kids in their own homes, in a place that is uninvolved with school. The person responsible needs to be punished and put in prison. It doesn't matter if his intention was to watch the kids undress or just to track missing laptops, if he turn the camera on at random times, he's going to see things that the students don't want him to see. I don't know if anyone has noticed, but cameras are becoming more and more common. It's a great thing for people to protect property by using security cameras, but now I'm noticing that they are everywhere, and soon they're going to be in places that we would consider to be an absurd place to put a camera today.

Now, even cell phones are able to record images just like little cameras.

I remember some years ago, before there was any cell phone cameras, I heard about some guy in a city park taking pictures of kids in the playground.

He was not a parent of any of the kids, but just a total stranger, and some other guy got pissed off because this pervo was taking pictures of his kids without permission, so he grabbed the camera from him and smashed it, and then the pervo got his teeth pushed down his throat and his ass kicked.

Now, thanks to these call phone cameras, you can take pictures without anybody knowing it.

Recently, I have heard about a suggestion that soon all cell phones with cameras should have a bright LED, Light Emitting Diode, that flashes and the cell phone makes a clicking noise just like an old fashion camera, that way nobody will be able to take pictures of kids without somebody knowing it.

Then, if you see a bright flash, and hear a loud buzz and a clicking sound, you'll know somebody was photographing your kids without your permission, and you can grab his cell phone, stomp on it, push his teeth down his throat, and kick his ass, just like in the good ol' days before silent cell phone cameras.

[Fat Man]

I don't even speak English as a first language, but the word "voyeur" is not always meaning like a pervert.

Yeah, I know what a voyeur is and what voyeurism is.

A person who derives sexual gratification from observing the naked bodies or sexual acts of others, especially from a secret vantage point.

If one is observing adults in sexual acts, then that is voyeurism.

But if it one watching children undressing and taking showers, then it's pedophilia.

The assistant principal and the school board members were not merely engaging in voyeurism. No, they are perverts engaging in pedophilia and they should have their fun-parts cut off and be executed!

If I remember, you once said that you are a fashion model.

Fashion, and sports, are merely two sides of the same evil coin!

Sports inspires bullying, beatings, rape, and death!

Fashion inspires eating disorders, anorexia, and death!

I'm not at all surprised that people in sports and fashion would defend pedophilia and call it voyeurism!

Yeah! Sports and fashion, two sides of the same evil coin.

I rest my case,

NEXT CASE!!!