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Google has settled a case brought in 2020 by the parents of an Illinois girl who sued the company in state court alleging that it had violated two sections of the Biometric Information Privacy Act. The case also alleged that Google had violated the law by failing to obtain parental consent to collect, store, and use biometric data belonging to millions of children and had illegally harvest other data such as physical location, website histories, personal contact lists, passwords, and…
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Los Angeles schools superintendent Alberto Carvalho is appointing a task force to find out what went wrong and how to move forward with an AI chatbot intended to issue advice and create individual acceleration plans for every student. The company, AllHere, has apparently collapsed financially, but the school district still has no idea why. Its former manager, Chris Whiteley, has said the company implemented security and privacy in ways that violated school district policy, sound pracctice, and…
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The Utah State Board of Education has approved a $3 million contract with Utah-based AEGIX Global that will let K-12 schools in the state apply for funding for AI gun detection software from ZeroEyes for up to four cameras per school. The software will work with the schools' existing camera systems, and notifies police when the detection of a firearm is verified at the ZeroEyes control centre. The legislature will consider additional funding if the early implementation is successful. The…
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In an interview conducted by the Los Angeles Unified School District’s investigative team, Chris Whiteley, the former senior director of software engineering at AllHere, explained his concerns with the security and privacy aspects of the design of “Ed”, an AI chatbot intended to assist students. Whiteley says the chatbot placed students’ personally identifiable information at risk by including it in all chatbot prompts, even when the data wasn’t relevant. District leaders need to conduct…
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The United School Administrators of Kansas, who represent more than 2,000 administrators in the state, are partnering with Seattle-based Indicio to install its Indicio Proven product, which will issue and verify transcripts and other records with ID verification.Link to articlePublication: Biometric UpdateWriter: Joel R. McConvey
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Los Angeles public schools have turned off an AI chatbot custom-designed to help parents and children navigate the school system after only three months because AllHere, which created it, mostly shut down. The information the chatbot dispensed is still available on the school’s platform, and the district intends to bring it back once officials figure out how to proceed. The school’s contract was worth $6 million over five years; about half it had been paid.
Link:LAUSD shelves its hyped AI…
Content type: Examples
The United School Administrators of Kansas, who represent more than 2,000 administrators in the state, are partnering with Seattle-based Indicio to install its Indicio Proven product, which will issue and verify transcripts and other records with ID verification.Link to articlePublication: Biometric UpdateWriter: Joel R. McConvey
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Skeptics at an education conference pushed parents to question AI vendors' pitches instead of gambling children's privacy for promises of increased on-campus safety. Even so, schools are increasingly upgrading surveillance systems to incorporate AI and biometrics in the name of safety. Link to article Publication: Biometric UpdatePublication date: 2024-03-07Writer: Jim Nash
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Fifty-five percent of US parents say they need financial help to buy the technology their children need for school, according to a survey conducted by EcoATM Gazelle, which sells refurbished devices.
Link: Parents are going into credit card debt buying back-to-school tech, survey says
Publication: Quartz
Writer: Ben Kesslen
Content type: Examples
The ACLU of Maine has criticised the Caribou school district and the Pennsylvania-based biometric education company IdentiMetrics for mishandling a contract by not laying out clear plans for protecting student data. The contract was to supply a biometric finger scanner to track student attendance data; it was cancelled when parents raised concerns about data privacy. IdentiMetrics have further contracts with thousands of other school districts in 48 states. Link to articlePublication: The…
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The Newport-Mesa [California] Unified School District Board of Education approved a new AI-enhanced surveillance system from Everon LLC (formerly ADT Commercial) that includes automated cameras, software that can spot after-hours intruders, read car licence plates, and monitor for signs of emergencies, including gun shots. The system can automatically notify the police, fire, and school authorities and speed the process of reviewing recorded video footage.
Link: School board approves new AI-…
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Workplace surveillance has become a reality in the US in every type of job from financial executives to radiologists to warehouse workers, tracking in detail how workers spend their time. Often, time spent on manual tasks does not register as working time, leading to lost pay or even lost jobs. Workers subjected to electronic surveillance report that they have lost autonomy and that the constant pressure of electronic micromanagement is demoralising, humiliating, and toxic. https://www.…
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A summary of Karen Levy's 2023 book Data Driven, which studies the installation of electronic logging devices in the cabs of US truckers, removing much of their traditional autonomy. Nominally installed to improve safety, the devices actually are making trucking less safe by pushing experienced drivers out of the profession and removing the flexibility that allows truckers to respond to conditions on the ground. Strategies are needed to ensure that AI does not fundamentally reallocate burdens…
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Trailing well after their European counterparts, US and Canadian trade unions are just now beginning to push for protections against workplace surveillance. The Communications Workers of America has won requirements that managers notify workers when recording their calls and a guarantee that those calls will not be used to evaluate or discipline workers. AFL-CIO has created a technology institute to build its expertise and policies on AI and other technologies; it will also offer training for…
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Wisconsin schools use a racially discriminatory Dropout Early Warning System built by the state to identify incoming 9th graders who may be at risk of failing to graduate on time in order to offer them help. The system’s machine learning algorithms make their assessments based on test scores, disciplinary records, lunch price status, and race. In a study of millions of predictions over a decade, The Markup finds that the system may be wrongly and negatively influencing teachers’ impressions of…
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A new report finds that monitoring software is in wide use in US K-12 schools, and that teachers, parents, and students generally believe the benefits outweigh the risks while still expressing some privacy and equity concerns. The authors recommend transparency, data minimisation, and mitigation of inequitable results stemming from this monitoring. The authors also recommend that schools should retain control of the data and build capacity within the school system and surrounding communities as…
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An investigation finds that using search tools provided by the College Board, the organisation that administers SATs and Advanced Placement exams for university-bound students, prompts it to send details of SAT scores, grade point averages, and other data to Facebook, TikTik, and other companies via pixels embedded in its site. The tools help students find colleges that accept students with specific grades or test scores. College Board says the pixels are merely there to measure the…
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The spread of edtech has not, as hoped, levelled the playing field but widened the gap in skills between children of affluence and children of poverty, a new study finds. Removing problems of access - for example, by placing computers in public libraries - doesn't solve this because given access rich kids and poor kids use technology differently, often because children of affluence have more guidance who help solve frustrating problems and steer children towards educational resources. The net…
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A student in Minneapolis was outed when their parents were contacted by school administrators when surveillance software found LGBTQ keywords in their writing on a school-supplied laptop. The risk of many more such cases is increasing as the use of edtech spread, fuelled by the pandemic, and legislation, lawsuits, and pressure campaigns push schools to implement anti-LGBTQ policies. Software such as Gaggle, which surveils school computers and student accounts, constantly monitors students…
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Experiments with personalised technology-mediated learning have been successful in the controlled environment of charter schools, but now must prove their worth in traditional district schools with much larger class sizes, more rigid schedules, long-established teaching and learning cultures, and the pressures imposed by standardised tests. In a pilot, the California-based charter school network Summit Public Schools is offering its tools, training, and support for free to help other schools…
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The Innovation Academy in Sunrise, Arizona, is experimenting with offering 90 sixth through eighth-graders self-paced computerised lessons that generate data four teachers can use to monitor their progress, spot students who need help, and develop small-group activities. Key to the programme is "little data" that helps students understand their strengths and weaknesses and develop personalised learning plans. The Dysart district, where Sunrise is located, hoipes to expand the programme to all…
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Many US schools give students tablets, but the key to their successful use is providing data plans. The US's "homework gap" is the lack of at-home Internet access that keeps many children from being able to use the benefit from the many investments in edtech that are being made. In a new intiative, Qualcomm is working with other leaders in wireless technology to create the equivalent of a reduced-lunch plan for data.Article: Data plans key to schools' success with tablets Publication:…
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Chromebooks, which many schools purchased at the beginning of the pandemic because of their lower cost compared to PCs and Macs, are proving expensive as their prices rise, the cost of repairs bites, and Google's expiration policy means many models are about to become e-waste. A study from US PIRG finds that doubling the Chromebooks' lifespan could save public schools $1.8 billion. Older Macs and PCs, by contrast, can go on being used and have resale value. Article: Chromebooks expire to…
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Google is working to extend the lifespan of Chromebooks by providing software updates for up to a decade. The new policy, which will begin in 2024, will ensure that no current Chromebook expires in the next two years. The expiration dates were proving expensive for schools, which were having to spend millions of dollars on replacements because unsupported Chromebooks can't be used for mandatory state testing. Article: Google extends life of ChromebooksPublication: Wall Street JournalWriter…
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Months after a District Court judgment that Cleveland State University violated student privacy in requiring the use of an online proctoring service that required a scan of students' rooms, some professors California colleges were still using such software for remote exams. Privacy rights campaigners argue that the software is invasive and discriminatory and a violation of the Fourth Amendment; e-proctoring companies reply that the data they collect is limited.Article: California colleges use…
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New research shows that schools' scramble to adopt new technologies in schools have given for-profit companies a massive opening into the data of young people's everyday lives and created an $85 billion industry that has brought security and privacy risks for all concerned. Schools, meanwhile, lack the resources and knowledge to manage security vulnerabilities. Article: Edtech gives technology companies portal into students' lives Publication: LA School ReportWriter: Mark Keierleber…
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The New York State Department of Education has prohibited schools in New York State from purshasing or using facial recognition technology. Schools can use other types of biometric identifying technology as long as they consider the privacy implications. Article: New York State bans facial recognition in schoolsPublication: New York State Education DepartmentWriter: NYSED
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A large-scale preprint study of more than 100 million rides between 2018 and 2019 in Chicago, where a 2020 law requires ride-hailing apps to disclose fares, finds that the dynamic pricing algorithms used by ride-hailing companies such as Lyft, Uber, and Via are socially biased. The finding is in line with earlier studies by other organisations such as the Princeton Review that found bias in algorithmic pricing. The researchers found that prices for rides varied according to the average…
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A former Amazon warehouse worker writes that every day was "brutal" because of the "exploitative and dangerous" standards enforced by Amazon executives. Amazon's anxiety-inducing policies about bathroom use and low pay should be seen in context with fast food and retail workers, who frequently encounter violence on the job and many essential workers' struggle to afford the basic necessities of life. In response, workers are beginning to target investors as an important voice that can help…
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An excerpt from the new book "Arriving Today: From Factory to Front Door—Why Everything Has Changed About How and What We Buy", describes in detail the tracking systems used in Amazon warehouses to ensure workers meet their managers' targets. The system is a mix of surveillance, measurement, psychology, targets, incentives, slogans, and proprietary technologies.https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-way-amazon-uses-tech-to-squeeze-performance-out-of-workers-deserves-its-own-name-bezosism-…