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School District Hit With New Mac Spying Lawsuit
CWmike writes "A former student at a suburban Philadelphia high school has sued his school district for allegedly spying on him and his family using a school-issued Mac laptop, according to court documents. The Lower Merion School District of Ardmore, Pa. was first sued in February 2010 by another student using similar charges. That case, dubbed 'Spygate' in some reports, was settled last October when Lower Merion agreed to pay Blake Robbins $175,000 and cover $425,000 in court costs. On Monday, Joshua Levin, a 2009 graduate of Herriton High, charged the district with violating his civil rights and privacy by remotely activating the notebook's built-in camera to take photographs and screenshots. On Wednesday, Lower Merion spokesman Doug Young called Levin's lawsuit 'solely motivated by monetary interests and a complete waste of the taxpayer's dollars.' Levin begged to differ. According to his lawsuit, Lower Merion used his laptop to take more than 8,000 photographs and screenshots between September 2008 and March 2009. A district report uncovered more than 30,000 photographs and 27,000 screenshots taken. Last June, lawyers made photos and screenshots available for viewing by the 76 affected students. 'Plaintiff opted to view the recovered images, and was shocked, humiliated and severely emotionally distressed at what he saw,' Levin's lawsuit stated."
Did he never notice the webcam light turning on? It is kind of hard to miss on all the Mac laptops I have seen.
?
I believe the pervs in IT were thinking of the children when they activated the webcams...
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Whoever modded you "troll" is an idiot. Clearly you were being sarcastic.
The irony is that the government doesn't want us to spy on Their actions (think wikileaks and learning the Mrs. Clinton was stealin credit card numbers), but when the government spies on us then it's okay.
It's for the children. Or for anti-terrorism. If they were honest they'd admit it's for their own desire to Control the masses, as the nobility has always done.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
I'm an adult (no really, I am) and even I sometimes use my laptops without being, er, fully ready to meet the public, as it were*.
Unless I miss my guess, a whole lot of these images would probably fall under the 'kiddie porn' category. I didn't RTFA, did they mention that in there? That bumps this issue up to a criminal court at least...even if someone is reviewing the images as they come in and 'deleting' the improper ones (wouldn't PedoBear love that job!), they've still been created, and viewed.
*Of course I also have a little piece of electrical tape over each and every one of my laptop webcams. Try to hack that!
"I love animals! Some are cute, others are tasty, what's not to like?" - Betsy Schroeder, Jeopardy contestant
Does it seem to anyone else that they're trying to shift blame onto the IT folks?
While I know nothing about the details of the report, or really the case beyond what has surfaced on Slashdot.... I find it hard to believe that the IT folks would be the ones directing which students to take pictures of, it seems that this direction would come from their superiors, the administration.
He's motivated by money? Well, yeah, but he's also right and I imagine the school district will be cutting another cheque. His motivation for filing the suit doesn't matter - all that matters is whether or not he's right and, as has been made clear, odds are very good that he is.
Why do you feel this case is wrong? Suing the hell out of the people who do these things is the only effective way to discourage others, if the state isn't going to imprison those responsible.
This doesn't seem like the kind of thing that should be solved by monetary re-imbursment.
There should be a federal investigation, and everyone who decided to spy on school kids, as well as everyone who was aware this was going on but didn't report it to the police, should be charged and possibly sent to prison.
Let me get this straight. School district staff turn on webcams and start taking pictures and screenshots, apparently 30,000 images worth, without authorization by parents (these are minors, they have no right, even if they had been told, to sign off on this spying scheme). You're attitude is that this is "money grabbing". If it was my kids, not only would I want a pile of cash to teach the school board a lesson, I'd want the weirdos tried in criminal court.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
I'm with you, except I would like to see the case filed against individuals in the district:
Principal of the school
everyone on the school board
head of IT
school superintendent.
All of those individuals *had* to know what was going on, and any one of them could have *stopped* it cold. They are the culpable ones and should face both civil and criminal charges. They can not claim I was following orders, because they are the ones that make the orders.
-nB
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If it was John Q. Sicko of 222 Anystreet Anytown USA, right now he'd be rotting behind bars while the the DA was deciding whether to charge him with possession of 10,000 porn images of minors or 15,000. But because they are employees of the school board in question, the victims of this are instead accused of being immoral money grubbing bastards.
Someone needs to sue these guys for millions. It's about the only way the assholes that run this shoddy little branch of government will get the point that what happened was not alright. I'd prefer criminal proceedings and sex offender designations for whoever was storing those images, but it's clear the school board is not interested in doing the right thing here, and the DA isn't interested in actually taking on some sickos, so the only route to justice is to turn the school board upside down and shake the money out of its pockets.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Whoever modded you "troll" is an idiot.
No surprise there. I looked at some of my comment mods and it alternated between "funny" and "troll" for quite some time. Once it hits "+4 funny" the troll mods stop. Maybe clue starts to hit at that level: "Oh, 4 people thought this is funny. Maybe I should read it again and look for irony markers." Just odd that that doesn't happen at "+2 funny" already. I suggest a new mod-point: "+-0 I don't get it". It doesn't mod it up or down, but gets rid of a mod point.
If one of us sneaked a camera into someone's home and took pictures, I guarantee we would go to prison for it. One of our civilizations greatest failings is the way our legal system treats kids. In the southern US it is still legal for schools to sexually assault their students. The Supreme Court's answer is always that "the Constitution does apply but..." followed by some senile hand-waving to excuse forced strip searches, beatings or any other gross violation of human rights the school wants. The reality is our legal system treats children like property. Kids would have more rights if they were prisoners. -Posting comment a 2nd time because the first one seems to have disappeared
On Wednesday, Lower Merion spokesman Doug Young called Levin's lawsuit 'solely motivated by monetary interests and a complete waste of the taxpayer's dollars.'
I'm appalled by the sheer lack of concern of the privacy issue raised by this lawsuit, and the respect for students indicated by this official statement. I'd start a campaign to vote out the current admin if my children were given this kind of treatment.
The arrogance of a typical school's administrative personnel is not to be believed. Really, it's just over the top.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.