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Lower Merion School's Report Says IT Dept. Did It, But Didn't Inhale
PSandusky writes "A report issued by the Lower Merion School District's chosen law firm blames the district's IT department for the laptop webcam spying scandal. In particular, the report mentions lax IT policies and record-keeping as major problems that enabled the spying. Despite thousands of e-mails and images to the contrary, the report also maintains that no proof exists that anyone in IT viewed images captured by the webcams."
I sure hope those "IT Dept" folks have emails archived indicating the request to do this.
Otherwise...wow. I feel bad for them.
Sent from your iPad.
It's Lower Merion.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
Oh these people are boned, scapegoating in a preliminary report.
And with American Child Pornography Laws, it doesn't matter if you saw it, if you possess it, each image is 10 years+
Must be quite a few incriminating photos, might want to move your kid if you live in that area, I have a feeling the Education Budget is going to be depeleted in that town for quite some time.
Ok, really "Lax IT policies" and "record keeping"? How is that even an excuse? Yeah, if perhaps like 30 pictures were taken it could be blamed on that. But seriously? 58,000 pictures? There is more than lax IT policies. Yeah, perhaps someone might do it once to get a laugh, but no (sane) person is going to do it 58,000 times.
How hard is it not to activate software unless the laptop has been stolen? It it isn't like its too hard to determine if it has been stolen or not...
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
I probably watch too many cop shows but when a suspect says, "No proof exists", it's usually a sign of moral guilt. Maybe even of distruction of evidence. Regardless, this is weak and should be treated as a serious infringement against the privacy of the students and their families.
IMHO, of course. Oh, and IANAL but I do watch Law and Order. ;)
-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
put the gun in jail, we are innocent.
Really how did they see the kid eating Mike and Ike's candy?
And isn't a crime to spy even if you don't look at the data?
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
You never know where there may be a camera, especially outside. You never know where your intertube bits may end up. Assume the worst. This is just a preview of the future.
We were told there would be jetpacks! Where's my jetpack, damnit!
God is always watching you.
The "independent" report was written by a law firm hired by the school system.
The IT guy made forum posts talking about the "security" system.
The school used the software to do more that locate and retrieve lost or stolen laptops with all this starting because one student was accused of dealing "drugs" (aka Mike & Ike candy) based on a captured image.
This report is just posturing by adults who should know better but who have stupidly done something unethical and illegal.
The adults involved should be subject to a "zero tolerance" interpretation of the law. They can make new friends in prison and learn a trade since they won't again be employed in education in their lifetime.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
No really! We got a ton of pictures but no one ever looked! You can't prove it!
Seriously?
How in the world can anyone believe that? Then what in the heck was the purpose of taking the pictures? The whole point of taking pictures is to look. No reasonable person would believe 58,000 pictures were taken but no one looked. Nice try though.
God is always watching you.
No, God is always watching you because you're probably up to no good. For the rest of us it's the "honor system".
No, she isn't.
One would think a teenager alone in his own bedroom would have a "reasonable expectation of privacy". Especially since we all KNOW what teenagers do when alone in their own bedrooms!
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
There may not be practical privacy, but there's still a right to privacy and laws against spying.
Assume the worst, but don't be complacent and tolerant when it happens.
When walking the street at night in a bad neighborhood, I try to stay in the light and away from dark corners. Assuming the worst. If I am mugged or assualted, I'm still calling the cops.
The enemies of Democracy are
Lately, God had been paying a lot more attention to YouTube than to my personal life.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
This is not a case of a photograph taken in public, it is a case of a photograph that was secretly taken inside someone's home. There are specific protections against that sort of behavior, particularly when it is a government agency engaging in it. Yes, privacy still matters, despite the fact that it has become cool to voluntarily abandon it.
Palm trees and 8
*An investigation by a law firm hired by Microsoft finds that Microsoft never engaged in monopolistic practices. The report states that lax programming practices enabled the anti-competitive acts.
*An investigation by a law firm hired by SCO finds that all UNIX copyrights belong to SCO. The report states that lax code-auditing practices enabled the theft of SCO's precious intellectual property.
*An investigation by a law firm hired by the law firms hired by SCO and Microsoft finds that you cannot tell if a lawyer is lying by seeing if his mouth is moving. The report states that lax joke-telling practices enable the spread of this malicious slander.
--Maureen O'Gara
I've heard that on average, a person is captured on camera 1,000 times in a given day in London. That number seems a little high, when when I was there, I did notice camers EVERYWHERE.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
It is the minions fault, of course no one in management would ever do anything amoral.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
To be clear, this was a report done by a law firm retained by the school district to "investigate" the situation. One shouldn't take it as conclusive or impartial.
For pretty much all of the crimes I can think of, in the United States, the defense "I did X, but I did not do Y", where Y follows from X, does not let you off the hook. For example, "Yes, I have drug X in my possession, but I did not consume". I could also take this into the world of inappropriate imagery, but I'm not (although you, dear reader, probably did).
Besides, this is the world of computers and the Internet. Do the images still exist, and if not, how much time was there between the image's capture and it's deletion? Are there any images kept around in backups, particularly daily or incremental backups whose tapes have not yet been overwritten?
If you have a stash of images, it is entirely possible – many will say likely; some will say guaranteed – that those images will make their way out onto the Internet, especially when being so in-the-news like this makes you a target, at which point those images will exist on the Internet forever, with each image eventually being linked to the person(s) included in the image. It is critical that (a) this be prevented, and (b) everyone at Lower Merion is made aware of what can happen (could have happened).
In all honesty, we aren't too far from cameras being in all our homes. London already has them on every street. Imagine 20-30 years from now when they realize that cameras on every corner street doesn't stop all the activity the administrators don't like.
This is the problem with the advance of technology: when it becomes extremely cheap, the temptation to abuse technology and violate privacy (if that concept even still exists) becomes greater and greater.
An assistant principal looked at images of a student in their home and punished the student for what they saw.
I'll buy their excuse once the can explain how the I.T. department did the above. Explain how the assistant principal didn't know of the capability while punishing the student for a picture taken in the students home using this very capability.
The capability was known and the invasion of privacy was just fine with the administration until the moment they got sued. If it weren't, the situation causing the lawsuit could never have happened in the first place.
This sentence no verb.
We do? ...or are you trying to tell us that you were one of the school district IT guys, so you know for sure?
Let's just say I remember being a teenager... with a lot of time on my hands.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
What, write Space Invader clones in BASIC for the Commodore PET?
That's what I did, anyway.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
So someone says that lax policies enabled the spying, and they also said there's no evidence that spying has occurred. Well really who cares? I wouldn't blink an eye about the policies
What I really care about is why there is a remote controlled camera in my house! I would want the head of the person who installed the software to remotely enable the webcam without my consent. After that, then I'll start caring about the policies that let this feature be used without supervision.
Really the idea wasn't bad. But what was bad is that the school administered it. If the laptop came with the remote software and the parents of the students each got to chose and individual private password, and no other access existed, then the safety to the laptop would have been the same and all privacy retained.
The monitoring software is a commercial product, isn't it? Anyone know how much it costs? If the cost is non-trivial, it seems likely that someone reasonably high up in the school administration had to approve the purchase and therefore knew what it was for.
These are, like a lot of other organizations, public institutions. We should be spying on them, we should be telling them what they can and can't do, and they should be accountable for their actions judged by the very people who employ them, the citizens. Since when did the government, in it's various flavors, develop this sense of entitlement? I'm keeping it brief...
Oh, and IANAL but I do watch Law and Order.
Mr. Simpson, don't you worry. I watched Matlock in a bar last night. The sound wasn't on, but I think I got the gist of it.
You know, you are really not helping to dispel the stereotype of the "typical slashdot reader"!
So... have you lost your virginity yet?
What's it like?
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
school IT is all over the place from clueless to nice systems.
You can read it all from schools who have to cover up not know anything about firefox to super locked down systems that students have to by pass to get work done.
also with gems like kids facing jail time for useing the system password that is the School's address and on the back of the laptop.
Link to the report here http://www.lmsd.org/documents/news/100503_ballard_spahr_report.pdf
I really wonder how much this so very carefully woven report cost. It's quite a piece of work.
Those who can, do. Those who cannot, sue.
Messy. Less fulfilling than expected. And the child processes are a hassle to maintain.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
No, the entire union didn't have rights to look at the pictures -- be serious!
But you're wrong to stop at the governor, since people above him had dominion. Obama's going to jail for this one, and depending on how long it went on, GW as well. Oh, and all of the department of Education.
Also everyone on Lower Merion's PTA.
These perverts need to go to prison.
-=[ Who Is John Galt? ]=-
Where is the FBI investigation findings the kids attorney?
All those movies I downloaded - well there's no evidence to say I watched them.
How is that even an excuse?
I vas folloving ordess.
The other response was troll-worthy, but I'd like to share my chant from when I was 14: "I'm going to masturbate, till I ejaculate" (repeat like 60 times or so, make sure your parents are out back in the garden, and for God's sake have a lot of toilet paper around it because who knows how much it will spew!).
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
The plural of Nazi is Nazis, and you made a punctuation error not a grammar mistake.
Damping absorbs vibrations. Dampening is caused by moisture.
Did the IT department decide on its own to install this monitoring software? No, the school administration did. Were the IT workers free to do whatever they wanted? No, they were required to perform jobs assigned by the school administration. Who suspended a student because the picture showed him taking drugs? Yup, the school administration.
Do we believe what the lawyers are saying? Of course not; they're paid to lie and their "you can't prove it" comment shows how they feel about the truth here. It's no surprise that the school administrators are worried - because they've jumped into the same pit as many other child molesters and kiddie porn vendors with both feet. They're even worse because their victims didn't even know they were being filmed.
Justice would require that their occupation and standing be disregarded and the mere facts of their crimes be considered: secretly installing video monitoring in the bedrooms of hundreds of minor children and using that equipment to take at least 60,000 pictures of those minors in various states of undress. These are serious crimes and the excuses they are offering are just the same sort of excuses other felons who have been caught would offer in their own defense. Considering the number of offenses, it would be multiple life sentences - if the law works the way it is supposed to.
You'd better believe that if one of us were secretly taking pictures of hundreds of minors they'd put us in prison and throw away the key. Let's see what happens when school administrators do that same thing. If they don't draw long prison sentences, I'd be asking loudly why not.
Nice example for kids to follow. The first bunch of students who causes the next Depression get A grades! World War III? AAA!!
I was just following orders dontcha know?
You don't have the right to claim expediency when sacrificing moral values. Either you think it's right or you think it's wrong, and if you think it's wrong and you still do it then you are immoral.
I am not willing to teach my kids that's OK. My kids understand that if it comes down to committing crimes for my boss or losing my job, then I will lose my job. It's called citizenship.
I weep for your children.
Yet another reason I feel the need to get the hell out of IT and find something new. I've already seen the sharp pointed edge of IT politics pointed at my throat and it wasn't fun. I feel that someday I won't be so lucky. There's only so many times you can hope to cover your own ass. Someday, I may miss a spot and that one spot will be the missing dragon's scale.