Maryland's Student Data Privacy Act of 2015

Last fall, California enacted what Education Week called a "landmark" student-data privacy law (SB 1177).  This was passed because some educational technology companies were caught abusing their access to personal student data. 

As a parent, the digital privacy of my children is very important.  I don't want an educational technology vendor using my kids' school created digital data for behavioral advertising or for profiling purposes that may be utilized to discriminate against them in the future.  The Family Educational Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) was enacted in 1974 and has not kept up with the innovative digital learning technologies that are becoming more widely available for our students. 

Today, schools utilize cloud-based technologies, apps, and other digital services to teach our children.  Unfortunately, metadata created from these platforms is not considered an educational record under FERPA and thus not protected from the prying eyes of advertisers and others who covet this rich information.  Therefore, students and their families need stronger legal privacy protections.  Absent more robust student privacy laws, our children's privacy and safety will be compromised and innovative learning and educational technologies will face increased parent skepticism and opposition. 

Maryland, a state that has vied with California to be a national leader in digital privacy protection recently introduced the Student Privacy Act of 2015.  The bill is modeled after California's groundbreaking SB 1177.  Mark Schneiderman, senior director of education policy for the Software & Information Industry Association said California's SB 1177 "seems to generally strike the right balance".  Thus, the SIIA should hold the same position on Maryland's student data privacy act. 

Last month, President Obama gave a historic speech at the FTC about his privacy agenda for the last two years of his term.  In regards to student privacy the President stated: "But we’ve already seen some instances where some companies use educational technologies to collect student data for commercial purposes, like targeted advertising.  And parents have a legitimate concern about those kinds of practices.

So, today, we’re proposing the Student Digital Privacy Act. That's pretty straightforward.  We’re saying that data collected on students in the classroom should only be used for educational purposes -— to teach our children, not to market to our children. We want to prevent companies from selling student data to third parties for purposes other than education.  We want to prevent any kind of profiling that outs certain students at a disadvantage as they go through school."

Congress is also concerned about student privacy issues.  On February 12, 2015, it held a hearing entitled, "How Emerging Technology Affects Student Privacy".  The testimony during the hearing demonstrated that FERPA needs to be updated.  While my hope is that one day Congress passes stronger student privacy legislation, I am not optimistic in the short term due to all of the acrimony on Capitol Hill. 

Until this occurs, states such as Maryland must fill this void and step up to protect the digital privacy and cyber security of our kids. 

Copyright 2015 by Shear Law, LLC All rights reserved.

Survey Says: Parents Care About Online Data Privacy in Their Children's Schools

A Brunswick Insight survey was released earlier this week regarding digital privacy issues that affect school students.  The online survey was conducted between August 25-28, 2012 and questioned 1,035 American adults who had children in grades 1-12.  The survey's margin of error was +-3% at the 95% confidence interval. 

The overall findings of the survey strongly indicate that U.S. parents care deeply about the digital privacy of their children.  The survey results demonstrate that a national conversation is needed regarding student privacy in the Digital Age. 

Overall, 93% of parents surveyed expressed concern regarding online tracking of their children. A majority of parents questioned (54%) stated they were "very concerned" about online advertising companies tracking the email and Internet usage habits of their children while in school in order to target them with Internet advertising. Even though more than nine in 10 parents surveyed were concerned that at some schools online advertising companies may be tracking the email and Internet usage habits of children in order to target them with digital advertising, almost half (49%) of parents stated they have heard "nothing at all" about this issue.

An overwhelming majority (92%) of parents agreed that school boards that accept free email services from advertising firms should require the companies to offer a privacy policy expressly designed for school children that provides strict guarantees against user profiling or web tracking.  In addition, 90% of parents surveyed agreed that school boards that accept free email services from advertising firms should insist on contracts that expressly ban the use of children's email for ad-related purposes, including targeting of ads outside the email service.  Furthermore, 87% of parents indicated that school boards that accept free email services from advertising firms should insist on contracts that expressly require that all advertising functionality, even if purely optional, be completely removed from the software.    

Interestingly, 84% of parents questioned stated that they would be likely to take action against online tracking in schools and 50% of those questioned stated they would be "very likely" to take action.  Potential action that was listed in the survey's questionnaire included speaking out at a PTA meeting or calling a school official.  This aspect of the survey was very telling because it indicates that parents are willing to take affirmative steps to protect the digital privacy of their children. 

During the past year, parents across the United States have gone from indicating in surveys that they would be likely to take action to protect the digital privacy rights of their children to taking affirmative steps to stop practices they believe harm the digital privacy and safety of their children.  For example, parents in Delaware, California, New Jersey, and Michigan have worked to ban schools from being able to request or require students provide access to their personal digital accounts so schools may track their students' personal digital activities. 

Parents and public school students in Texas have protested against being required to wear school identification badges embedded with RFID chips that digitally track their movements while at school.  In Maryland, parents' outrage over schools that were utilizing palm scanners to obtain biometric data from students to pay for school lunches and potentially track the eating habits of students recently led to the termination of the program.  The bottom line is that parents are willing to openly protest and take legal action against practices they believe may be putting their children in harm's way.    

When parents are provided the tools and opportunity to make informed decisions they act to protect the data privacy and safety of their children.  The findings of this Brunswick Insight survey indicate that more information and transparency is needed so parents may be able to learn more about these issues so they can take the appropriate steps necessary to protect their children's digital privacy and security.  

To learn more about these issues you may contact me at www.shearlaw.com.
 

Copyright 2013 by the Law Office of Bradley S. Shear, LLC All rights reserved.