<p>Cluelessdad - Still have to worry about the FBI, US Attorney, and the County District Attorney.</p>
<p>^ True, but same strategy on the criminal fronts: LMSD as a public institution wants show that it has been fully cooperative and not tried to cover anything up. Their best angle is lobbying for prosecutorial discretion not to charge: we didn’t understand this, as soon as we learned about it we investigated and are committed to doing right. </p>
<p>I do think at a minimum at least one head must be offered up for a criminal plea deal, but whose head? There are going to be some very uncomfortable moments among the LMSD staff as to who gets the honor.</p>
<p>Even if you give the most benign possible interpretation to the school system’s version of the story, they still have a big problem. That is, assume the school really thought this particular laptop was “missing,” and that the camera was activated solely to find out who had it. The resulting photo (and was there just one?) showed a recognizable student from the school, and the IT person thought it showed him doing something illegal. What happened next? It doesn’t sound like they approached him to return the computer–that hasn’t been mentioned at all. Instead, an Assistant Principal showed him a photo that appeared to show the illegal activity.
Two problems: (1) First, and most important, the students and parents weren’t told of the monitoring capability. (2) The camera was clearly used for a purpose beyond finding a lost computer. Whether the student was, in fact, doing something illegal is really irrelevant–indeed, in some ways its worse if he WAS doing something illegal, because of the potential consequences to him.</p>
<p>^^^It was obvious that the district was extremely careful with the way they worded the public statement. They insist that the district only collected images when they thought a laptop was missing… they didn’t say that’s the only thing the images were used for once they were collected.</p>
<p>It also said they they would never use the secret images to ‘discipline’ a student, but when addressing the point of what the AP was doing confronting the student with secret image(s) they say she was trying to “be supportive.”</p>
<p>I have some sympathy for the Assistant Principal. The tech comes to her and says, “We took a picture when the loaner laptop was missing, and it showed the student with drugs.” They recovered the laptop, so there was no more issue there. She wasn’t thinking “We got this evidence illegally.” It doesn’t even look like she was trying to discipline him. It looks like she was saying, “Look, we happened to see this picture of you, and it looks like you have a problem. Do you need help? And don’t be bringing that to school . . .” And she told the parents about it.</p>
<p>Isn’t that what you would want a school official to do with your kid?</p>
<p>Generally, I get a bad feeling from this Perbix stuff. He may well have been playing off the reservation (even assuming there WAS a reservation, which there may not have been). He certainly is auditioning for the role of scapegoat.</p>
<p>JHS:
I agree with your interpretation of what the AP was doing (or thought she was doing). But in that family’s shoes, I would still be enraged at the invasion of privacy. I agree, too, that Perbix seems to be the designated scapegoat.</p>
<p>An AP HAS to be worried about privacy and the legal environment as a school manager.</p>
<p>At work, I have to take ethics, harassment, diversity, etc. courses on a regular basis. I’d guess that school administrators take similar courses on a regular basis to keep up with areas that could land the organization in a lot of trouble with other organizations or legal entities.</p>
<p>I’m asking myself what illegal drug use could be revealed by a single still photo. Perhaps if it showed a bong, or an obviously hand-rolled cigarette? A syringe? But even if it showed a student holding something that looked like a pill, how could that suggest *illegal *drug use? I guess a Mike and Ike candy is shaped kind of like a pill. I just wonder if there aren’t more photos, or even video.</p>
<p>In all the many stores I’ve read about this affair there is hardly any mention of the District Superintendent and his role and responsibility in this situation.</p>
<p>These people are in it for the money, not the principle. If they had cared about the principle, they would have made a stink last fall, and the policy would have been changed by Christmas. It seems fairly clear that no one thought very hard about it except for the techs.</p>
<p>When your first salvo is a class action lawsuit, complete with press releases (and probably flacks) and a coordinated effort to interest the FBI, it’s not about changing the policy, it’s about scoring a big win.</p>
<p>Toblin@#309:
</p>
<p>That is because, to date, the superintendent himself has been controlling the selective NON-disclosure of this sordid history.</p>
<p>The Board has not yet decided who to pin this on. Deniability is the word of the day, so those at the bottom of the totem pole better hope they got their approvals in writing …</p>
<p>JHS–That might be. But, OTOH, if you’re really concerned about the civil liberties issues, you might pick the best way to be sure there’s a ton of publicity, precisely to keep the issue from being swept under the rug. Which is exactly what we have here.</p>
<p>And to echo others–it seems to me impossible to ascertain “illegal drug use” through a photo–I don’t think we have the technology, yet, to test what a substance is through pictures. And anyone who acted as the AP did with that assumption strikes me as someone who lacks basic critical thinking skills.</p>
<p>Very detailed investigation of the software implementation - quite technical, for those who are interested:</p>
<p>Do people do drugs in front of their computers? Mike and Ikes look like capsules so they could have been mistaken for prescription drugs. I can see someone eating candy in front of a computer. I’ve been known to do it myself with Sweet Tarts (those look more like pills). The thing is that the laptop camera on MacBooks is crappy and you’d probably have to be doing it right in front of the computer. If someone is shooting up in their home, do you think that they’re going to be doing it in front of their computer with their computer turned on? If someone is smoking then that’s pretty easy to determine. Just take the computer apart and you’ll see the signs of smoking. MacBooks suck air in through the keyboard and it vents out the back. You’ll have residue on the inside components (Apple techs can refuse to work on MacBooks that have residue from smoking in them as the stuff can be toxic).</p>
<p>You’re not supposed to link to blogs here but thanks anyways.</p>
<p>I wonder if the district also issues laptops to administrators and teachers.</p>
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<p>No tattletaling amongst the ranks!</p>
<p>Sorry about posting the blog link – but if it gets deleted, you can still find it if you google stryde and hax and Pennsylvania school. I just thought it was perhaps the best technical (vs. legal) analysis of the situation that I’ve seen.</p>
<p>There’s a video of the boy and his sister being interviewed at Fox News. They both look fairly good on camera and their demeanor is fine. They both express their concerns over privacy and the sister tells the interviewer what she did with her MacBook.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t expect a drug dealer to go on a television interview as he’d be inviting all of the people that he sold to to post about his dealing on forums. The kid sounds a lot more credible than their network administrator.</p>
<p>It’s a good analysis. They did a little hacking with the software. It appears that the SD’s server was unsecured. I wasn’t completely sure because of the wording but it might have been possible to get control of the SD’s server along with access to all of the laptops.</p>