Is My School Allowed to Do This?

[Dexiro]

They're allowed to monitor what you're doing, but I wouldn't say they're allowed to interact with what you're doing, other than maybe shutting off your internet connection.

I've heard of a school going as far as keylogging all of their students, THAT on the other hand shouldn't be allowed in any circumstances, not even on their own systems.

 

[ultimateownage]

Yes. They're bypassing it, so they're making sure they don't.

That's like them not being allowed to put CCTV cameras in stores, because they're violating you personal space while you steal stuff. Almost all schools have that these days.

 

[Jakub324]

It's brutal, but the legality of it depends on where the school is, I suppose.

 

[Sylveria]

EDIT: Ok, since many people have said yes, I have a follow up question. If someone is caught on Facebook etc, are they (the school) allowed to browse through the person's profile for information through said person's log in?

Anything you do on a school computer, the school can get their fingers into. Same goes for work computers if you have a job which uses them. There's no actual laws that prevent them from logging into your accounts if you supplied that information over their networks. Is it right? Eh, that's a bit of a gray area.

Moral of the story is if you want your private information and private life details kept private, do it at home, not at work/school/etc.

 

[JET1971]

So if it is a US public school, it is not allowed, but every court in the country allows it.

Actualy yes they are allowed to restrict access and yes they are allowed to monitor and observe what you are accessing when using the schools internet service. A public schools internet is provided for a learning resource FB, youtube, music/movie torrents are not in that category and if students are allowed to eat up bandwidth for non learning activities it slows the whole network down for those that are using it for the proper activities.

furthermore students should not be on facebook or twitter during class time and the schools are allowed to take steps to stop them from doing it because allowing them access is a privilage not a right.

 

[Locko96]

Yeah, definitely. My old school did that. You're in school and you shouldn't be on those sites anyways during class. Also, their providing the internet to you in school.

 

[spartan231490]

(Just to let you know, class ended for me back in June but this question has been popping in my head.)
Alright, so for about a year now, our school has implemented a "Big Brother" watch over school computers. More specifically, allowing teachers watch student screens and interact with them via their own desktop. They did this to make sure students aren't accessing Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr etc during school hours which make sense I guess. Of course, eventually some people at school found a loop hole by bring in their own laptops from home instead of using the public laptops at school.
But then the school decided to counter it by forcing students to register their laptops with the school before allowing them access to the internet allowing the school to monitor the activity of anyone accessing the school's internet.
So I'm wondering, are they allow to do that?

Note: I know someone is going to pop the question: well, why don't they use their own mobile phones? Our classes are quite small so hiding isn't easy and our teachers aren't push overs. If anyone is caught with a mobile phone out, they loose it for a week in the teacher's drawers and nobody wants to lose their phone.

EDIT: Ok, since many people have said yes, I have a follow up question. If someone is caught on Facebook etc, are they (the school) allowed to browse through the person's profile for information through said person's log in?

yes to initial question, no to the EDIT question. My school did the same thing, it makes sense. The school has every right to control what it's computers and it's internet is used for. However, teachers have no right to punish students by invading their privacy by searching through their fb pages.

 

[WrathOfAchilles]

Is it really that hard to stay off facebook? Long description short, like others have said yes the school can monitor your computer. The owner of the network (the school in this case) has full rights to all connections. Someone pointed out that it's your computer. Doesn't mean anything. Network owner rights still hold. This is something you better get used to now. People get fired all the time for "network abuse", doing things they shouldn't have on the company network, this goes for remote connections too. If you remote in from home with your own computer and do something that violates their policy they can fire you.

 

[AVATAR_RAGE]

Yes they are, Universities do it as a standard (in the UK), They will do the same with mobiles, and as a lot of school techies arn't mobile friendly that just mean no wi-fi for your mobile if you have to register your laptop.

Yep it's standard for universities, schools and colleges to do this. In fact my secondary school would (in exchange for keeping the laptop registered with them) scan and do basic software repairs.

 

[DomM]

The Geneva conventions have established that privacy and full internet access are due everyone.

that's the funniest thing i've read online in months =)

I thought much the same thing.

Do you think the right to access the internet comes immediately after the section outlawing poison gas or the bit guaranteeing medical care for prisoner of war?

 

[Micalas]

My school had software like that. We were a tech high school and we had computer networking and IT programs. One of the IT students found out the password to turn off the software. It was "2kill." o.o

 

[zaly]

I don't think stuff like that is anything new - they monitored internet access back when I was at secondary school years ago.
Also I cant say I see a problem?
They are not monitoring your internet access in your free time, they are only making sure you are behaving sensibly and doing your work whilst at school.
And it shouldn't make any difference whatsoever if you argue that you should be able to use your own laptop and not be monitored, the fact remains that you are at school and should be working. And its not that bad, admittedly I'm just speculating now, but when I was at school in IT lessons once you finished your work they then let you mess around on games etc.
I'm sure it'll be the same in the workplace, I would assume they monitor your internet access there as well so I can't see what the big deal is.

 

[mcpop9]

Bring a mobile wifi hotspot with you, your Internet your laptop they have no say.

 

[BlackWidower]

They are probably allowed to...but it certainly isn't right. Good news though, they aren't allowed to use your laptop to spy on you when you're at home. One school did that, they got crucified.

However, I will say this, they certainly have a right to control traffic on their network, especially since you get access for free. But having you "register" your personal laptop, which I assume means install spying software on it, well, that seems unnecessary and quite honestly, intrusive. It's pretty simple to set up OpenDNS to block access to certain sites on your network, and you don't need special software to do it, other than the firmware that's already on their network routers. Their IT guy can certainly figure out how to do that. Schools and industries should stop using overly complex software, and realize there are often simpler ways of doing things. For instance, you don't need complex third-party software to stop people from saving things to a public computer, especially when Microsoft already offers software that does just that. It's called Windows Steady State, and (last I checked) it's free.

If they are saying they need to see your computer screen at all times, well, that's not okay in my book. It's your laptop, and if you want to play Solitaire, that's your business. If they are trying to restrict network access, then they can, but that might not be what they're doing.

 

[Laser Priest]

If it's only while you're at the school, they are entirely permitted to and it is perfectly reasonable.

 

[teqrevisited]

It's their network, they can do whatever they like with the terminals operating within it. So long as they're not directly accessing private login areas (Like those associated with Facebook etc) with no relation to the network and its computers. Then it's getting into trouble.

 

[t3h br0th3r]

yep, they are allowed to in the USA.

While they can't read your emails (unless its a school email account), mess with your posts, or hack your stuff, they can block and or monitor as much as they want.

and i should also mention that SCHOOL AND BUSINESS PROVIDED EMAILS ARE NOT PRIVATE. if ur school or business gives you an email address, they have a right to read everything sent from and to it at will.

 

[Johnny-Natrium]

Well they're actually allowed to do that, but the thing you can really defend against is how they take away your mobiles for a week. That's impossibly entirely legal.

 

[Johnny-Natrium]

Well they're actually allowed to do that, but the thing you can really defend against is how they take away your mobiles for a week. That's impossibly entirely legal.

 

[Johnny-Natrium]

Well they're actually allowed to do that, but the thing you can really defend against is how they take away your mobiles for a week. That's impossibly entirely legal.