Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: karajorma on February 19, 2010, 08:18:03 pm
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/8523807.stm
Parents in the US have accused a school of spying on children by remotely activating webcams on laptops.
A couple from Pennsylvania have filed a lawsuit against a school district which gave laptops to its high school pupils.
They say their son was told off by teachers for "engaging in improper behaviour in his home" and that the evidence was an image from his webcam.
Let me get this straight. You give all the children in your school laptops containing software that will periodically take pictures of whatever is going on in front of the laptop and don't bother to tell anyone that this is the case?
In their lawsuit, they claim the webcams were activated remotely and images were taken which could have included anything going on in a room where the laptop was placed.
The legal papers say: "As the laptops were routinely used by students and family members at home, it is believed that many of the images captured and intercepted may consist of images of minors and their parents or friends in compromising or embarrassing positions, including in various stages of dress or undress".
Sounds like someone's ****ing lucky not to be ending up on the sex offenders register. :D
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That's pretty damning... if it's true. I hope the parents can back up their claim.
Actually, no, I hope they don't. I don't like the idea of anyone seeing what's through my camera unless I will it to be so.
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That's pretty damning... if it's true. I hope the parents can back up their claim.
Actually, no, I hope they don't. I don't like the idea of anyone seeing what's through my camera unless I will it to be so.
Hope they can if it's true, but hope that it's false so they won't need to. :D
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What.
The ****.
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...told off by teachers for "engaging in improper behaviour in his home"...
This is the part that gets me. What the student does in his own home is none of the school's business. Period.
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There are times when I think the world has seen the worst of human stupidity...
And then I read something like this. :rolleyes:
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This is the part that gets me. What the student does in his own home is none of the school's business. Period.
Hey, they suspend for Facebook postings if you let them.
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Never trusted webcams and never will. Don't have one but when I work on a laptop with one the first thing I do is stick a piece or electrical tape over it. Most have viruses to begin with and we all know that there are trojans out there that give access to webcams.
Then again I'm an old timer that thinks using a mic for online gaming is taboo........
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This is the part that gets me. What the student does in his own home is none of the school's business. Period.
Hey, they suspend for Facebook postings if you let them.
One of the higher courts just ruled against that a couple of days ago. Case took a couple of years but they are letting the suit against the school go through under free speech since it did not occur on school property.
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This is the part that gets me. What the student does in his own home is none of the school's business. Period.
Hey, they suspend for Facebook postings if you let them.
Mmm, kids at my school have been suspended/detained for being at a fight between two guys from another school, which took place on an oval about 1-1.5 hours from where the school is. Said it gave the school a bad rep.
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@ first post.
This is akin to someone just indiscriminately walking up to a kids bedroom and taking photos at random. How the hell can this be allowed? It's just mind boggling.
If teachers or anybody at all just walked up to a kids window and snapped away there would be uproar. I'm in complete shock and feel justifiably angry on the parents behalf.
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This violates so many privacy laws its not even funny.
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Big Brother is watching you.
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Not anymore. I just clocked the story on sky news.
Sticky tape ftw :lol: ingenious.
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/facepalm. Only in America.... and I say that as an American. :ick:
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/facepalm. Only in America.... and I say that as an American. :ick:
dont worry some one will try it here in the UK in a few years so we can laugh again. Problem is it wont be funny because it will all be revealed by someone hacking the system
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/facepalm. Only in America.... and I say that as an American. :ick:
as mentioned also in the UK, they recently gave there cops armed surveillance drones.
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Quidquid id est, timeo Danaos et dona ferentes
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/facepalm. Only in America.... and I say that as an American. :ick:
I wish it was that simple :D
But I think it is just another example of the human nature in general: If something is possible, it is just the question of time until someone tries it. Trusting "humanity" in this sort of thing never works. If you want to avoid it, the means to do so must be built in to the system.
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The school can still cover their own ass - Just claim they were freedom-haters, that'll open up a nice, giant loophole around all those pesky things like privacy and moral decency!
'Merica must be kept safe.
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Apparently Turambar went to one of the two high schools that have been doing this.
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not like webcams dont come with an indicator led to show that its active. not that it isnt possible to turn it off in software. when in doubt, keep a roll of electrical tape nearby.
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Official: FBI probing Pa. school webcam spy case
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/20/AR2010022000679.html
A Pennsylvania school district accused of secretly switching on laptop computer webcams inside students' homes is under investigation by federal authorities, a law enforcement official with knowledge of the case told The Associated Press.
The FBI will look into whether any federal wiretap or computer-intrusion laws were violated by Lower Merion School District officials, the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to discuss the investigation, told the AP on Friday.
I can't believe people thought this was a good idea.
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not that it isnt possible to turn it off in software.
Except in cases where the Webcams don't have LEDs, or where the Laptops are set up by the vendor to allow remote access to the hardware.
That said, some tape is a good investment.
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ive never seen a camera without an indicator led. doesnt mean they dont exist. i can see situations where it could be a security feature though. usually nothing a format cant fix.
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just checked, my laptop webcam has no indicator led.
and i've heard of it as a security feature. i've seen mac programs for it, where you can remotely turn on your webcam to take a picture of the person who stole your computer.
but the laptop in that case wasn't reported stolen. some school official apparently randomly decided to access the kid's webcam and take pictures. creepyyyyy
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Anyone willing to give up a little freedom for a little security will deserve neither and lose both.
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Anyone willing to give up a little freedom for a little security will deserve neither and lose both.
The old farts were sooo right... :nod:
I find this, as well as the unwarranted cell-tapping issues, very disturbing indeed.
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This is just...retarded...
How the hell can such a software pass undetected?
Also, wouldn't it require the laptop to be on the net for anyone to take any kind of control? And who in hell thought of this? Who wrote that software?
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This is just...retarded...
How the hell can such a software pass undetected?
Also, wouldn't it require the laptop to be on the net for anyone to take any kind of control? And who in hell thought of this? Who wrote that software?
The same way keyloggers do. You go into the AV settings and tell it to ignore the monitoring software that you use.
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The laptops probably have a bunch of software on them that the school officials put there. One little remote-access program can easily go unnoticed.
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The laptops probably have a bunch of software on them that the school officials put there. One little remote-access program can easily go unnoticed.
Ya, you don't exactly *have* to have shortcuts do them, and who is going to notice hidserv (instead of hidsrv, alternatively, pick another M$ task and rename it slightly or just have it running from a different location than the M$ one) running in the task list? If they don't hide it in svchost or something.
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more importantly, what percentage of high school students would check for stuff like this, or even know how to recognize it if they did?
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I don't really see how people can argue that no one's privacy was invaded. This isn't a case of some kids found the program on their laptop and people are freaking out over the "what-ifs." The whole thing came to light with a school official actually using the program to take a picture of a student doing something in their own home. There's the proof right there that the program was abused.
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It's possible if they were school supplied that the students don't even have rights to see what is running. They are probably locked down for school work only, have filtering software for the web, etc.
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I could see that. And it would be one thing to track what the student does with the computer, since it is the school's property. (You can't write whatever you want in textbooks either, unless you want to buy it at the end of the year.) Another thing entirely to spy on the student when they *aren't* using the computer, and it's just sitting on their desk. x.x
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I could see that. And it would be one thing to track what the student does with the computer, since it is the school's property. (You can't write whatever you want in textbooks either, unless you want to buy it at the end of the year.) Another thing entirely to spy on the student when they *aren't* using the computer, and it's just sitting on their desk. x.x
Precisely. Peeping Tom, anyone?
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Anyone willing to give up a little freedom for a little security will deserve neither and lose both.
The old farts were sooo right... :nod:
I find this, as well as the unwarranted cell-tapping issues, very disturbing indeed.
They were certainly pretty wise in this case.
Of course - as a total off-topic - people forget a lot of other stuff that the Founding Fathers advocated. They wanted the government to be slow and inefficient, as a form of control. And many (most?) of them were decidedly un-Christian, to a degree that would not be acceptable in politics today.
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In most cases they were rather moral, however - certainly there were a few quirks, but that's natural.
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I think it's rather telling that you read 'un-Christian' as 'immoral'. I didn't mean that - I think they were very moral people.
What I meant was, literally, that they were not Christian; they were often deists. Many of them found Christianity a wee bit absurd.
Although it's true that most of them did things which would have them thrown off the political stage today, too, especially with regards to their sexual habits.
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They also drank like modern-day alcoholics.
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And thought only rich white men should have any sort of political power.
These dudes really are sorta hit-and-miss.
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update: http://reason.com/blog/2010/02/20/lower-pervian-school-district
The kid that got in trouble based on images from his laptop? They thought candy was pills.
Why are these people in a position of power again?
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Wouldn't one solution to this be to just reformat the laptops and put linux on them?
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If the school is renting the laptops out, and the students do not own them, I'm pretty sure they could justifiably get in trouble for that.
If the students do own them... then I agree 100% that they should install their own OS. Of course most people who are not major geeks would probably be intimidated by the prospect and not possess the skills to install a new OS, especially Linux, which assumes some level of familiarity with computers and therefore is not meant to be used by the average user.
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Wouldn't one solution to this be to just reformat the laptops and put linux on them?
The solution you've come up with is to suggest that the students undertake a fairly difficult technical task (for under-aged students, many of whom have little computer experience) which may actually get them into trouble instead of getting the school district to stop an immoral and illegal practice?
Installing Linux isn't always the solution. What is wrong with you! :p
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u...Linux?....Linux...LINUX!!!!
...ENCHANTMENT!!!!
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Enchantment?
Enchantment!
(I can't decide if I love that dwarf or hate him.)
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Use a livecd/liveusb. Slax on thumb drive or memory card would do the job :yes:
And if you don't have a thumb drive or memory card, then use mepis the livecd.
There's always a strong possibility of being able to bring a system to it's knees for you needs with live media :nod:
The college i went to didn't password protect any of there bioses.
I got locked out of my college computer account when i didn't remember my password 5 times in a row trying to remember because they made me change it too often (and the techs were too incompetent to be able to make resetting my password work). So, in a crunch for time on a number of occasions without my eeepc, i'd have to hack a computer with livemedia to get an exam done. Justification is a wierd thing, hacking the college computers is wrong, but it was something i needed to do sometimes to pass my classes when i didn't have all of my resources with me (ie, performing a wrong to fulfill a necessity).
Whoever does password protect there bios is a smart ****er. After the fact not many people will go through the trouble of popping out the coin battery or even know what that would do.
That's my 2 cents, this problem is seriously ****ed. Talk about stepping out of bounds/school property. And possibly the moral implications of hacking something you'd get in trouble for. In this case with this high school, i'd support hacking that doesn't leave a trace (livemedia) so that webcam bull**** doesn't happen.
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let me bring back up again the point that these are high school kids, not computer experts. and the fact that before it happened, there would be no reason to suspect such behavior and therefor no reason to take action against it.
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Whoever does password protect there bios is a smart ****er.
Thanks. :)
EDIT: ever heard of Kon-Boot? You could use that as well to get into the admin account and access the cached files on the computer. Ophcrack works to retrieve your password, but IDK if it would work with their setup. Prolly not.
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My argument is why use those tools when you can just modify the boot sequence to be able to boot livemedia and access the internal hard drive of the computer as nothing more than a storage device. This leaves you to not needing to find out any passwords or account names since all of the contents will be right there before your eyes for any kind of manipulation.
And really a passworded bios wont stop somebody from popping out the coin battery in the computer, but it's better than no security at all for the bios.
Ophcrack and kon-boot sound legitimately handy for just resetting passwords in times of user forgetfulness and security auditing.
My main point is that it's easier to break into a system with livemedia and gain full access than it is by trying to break into the system via the OS on it's hard drive.
let me bring back up again the point that these are high school kids, not computer experts.
Point taken, just think of what i said as a recommendation for what the students could have done if they were computer experts.