Privacy

Facebook’s “Memories” feature is a cute way to reminisce on fun times and take a look back at how your children have grown over the years, but what about those posts (or people) you don’t want to remember?

To filter out someone you don’t wish to see in these nostalgia posts, point your browser to facebook.com/memories. When you land on the page, click the Preferences button. In the box that appears, click the Edit button next to People and enter the names you wish to filter out. You can also filter out events on certain dates.

Some schools are going to be testing out facial recognition software this next school year as a school security measure. Privacy experts have complained that the software does not do a good job especially with the faces of teen girls and minorities. Apparently it can also have trouble with other more familiar faces as well.  In a test of Amazon’s facial recognition software, the American Civil Liberties Union ran photos of members of Congress against a database of 25,000 mugshots. The software concluded that 28 of the lawmakers were criminals, including six members of the Congressional Black Caucus. Amazon said the software, which is being tested by police departments, was a tool and not a final authority. Just good to know if your school tries out this technology this fall.

Education technology expert Douglas Levin recently revealed findings that are not sitting well with privacy advocates. A recent NY Times article cites Levin’s study in stating that most public  while you are on it you are likely being tracked. All but one public-school website out of 159 examined by Levin were found to have some type of ad tracking or online surveillance technology embedded in them (placed there by the company who sold the software to the school), meaning that based on what you look at, that information may be sold to outside third parties who will then push ads and other information your way. While this kind of tracking is considered fair game by some, others have raised concerns about data privacy including the fact that children may be being tracked illegally while on a school’s website retrieving information about mundane things such as a homework assignment.

The Associated Press is reporting that some companies are offering US schools free facial-recognition software that is also used on city streets and among government agencies and businesses. At odds with this move, digital-rights advocacy groups are expressing concerns about the software's effects on privacy, and the New York Civil Liberties Union has asked the state's education officials to prevent schools' implementation of the software. Others question the technology’s cost and effectiveness, given reports like one released in February by MIT and Stanford University that found some facial recognition programs don’t work well in correctly identifying people who belong to racial minorities or women.

A recent email hack includes information including an old password you might have once, making you believe they have information on you. These sorts of online extortion schemes — which try to guilt people into paying off hackers claiming to have compromising information — are nothing new. As for the inclusion of a real password, after years of database breaches from major sites and services like Yahoo, eBay, Sony PlayStation and dozens of other companies, varying amounts of people’s data are floating around the internet, often for sale on the black market. That data is now being integrated into traditional phishing scams.

According to the Krebs on Security blog, several recipients of this particular blackmail campaign observed that the password included in the message was old, some by about a decade, and not currently in use. For those who haven’t changed their passwords in years, the ruse could appear more realistic, and the hustle itself may become fine-tuned as the perpetrators weave in fresher bits of stolen user data.  Important to keep in mind for yourself, but also for discussing with your children who may fall prey to these schemes as well. Remembering to update your passwords frequently is a good security practice. You can also report phishing incidents on the F.B.I.’s Internet Crime Complaint Center site.

“Cyberattacks against the US are on the rise and have reached a critical point,” said Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats recently. Coats identified China, Iran, North Korea and Russia as the biggest threats, saying that they target federal agencies, state and local governments, businesses and even schools every day.

A national network of "fusion centers" -- secret facilities that gather information to help support public safety -- are working to help stop school shootings before they occur. While this may sound like a big advancement for school safety, EdSurge reports that the work that includes culling social media and data to identify threats and predict where school shootings may happen has actually created debate among privacy experts and advocates. They worry that there is a risk of misidentifying students as threats. Experts note slang words that are not threat related often appear in texts such as ‘I killed that test’ or ‘these shoes are the bomb’. Calls to open more of these monitoring centers are increasing as the number of school shootings rises.

According to EdTechOnline, Michael Hawes, director of the Student Privacy Policy and Assistance Division at the U.S. Department of Education, says that for schools, when it comes to student information and adhering to federal privacy law, the key is transparency with parents. Parents often complain because they see the risks of their child’s information being used, but not the benefits. If you don’t know how your children’s personally identifiable information is being stored and used, make sure to ask when school starts again in the fall.

What is the average age for kids to open a social media account? The last study done on the subject was back in 2016 and the average age was twelve and a half. Summer is a big time for kids to ask to open their own accounts to keep in touch with friends while school is out, so parents of kids around this age should be prepared. Psychologists say that around 12 years old is when kids have the capability to follow your rules and to understand that those rules are set in place for their safety. Sit down and talk about how to keep personal information – age, where they go to school, address, phone numbers, credit card numbers and more – private, and explore together the platform your child is interested in, including the privacy settings that can be used.