When it comes to crazy privacy invasive systems it is hard to outdo state governments. Combine that with natural control freakishness of school administration and the result can be mind boggling stupid. Exhibit A, Moorebank High School installing fingerprint scanners for students to use toilets. Just crazy.
September 6, 2022 |
At a time when children’s privacy is top of privacy regulators’ agenda around the world the school administrators in Moorebank have installed fingerprint scanners at their toilets. The rationale, to stop vandalism. A ridiculously out of proportion response to an eternally chronic problem. It brings to mind the saying that the problem with teachers are that they have never left school. Because if this initiative was not so concerning it would be just regarded as juvenile.
According to the State Education Department it is not compulsory to register their fingerprints however the alternative is to get an access card from the office every time a student wants to use the bathroom. What sort of choice is that! Making the alternative difficult and potentially embarrassing effectively restricts the choice. It makes it a non choice. In real terms there is no alternative but to consent for most students. The consultation process, as described, was farcical; through newsletters and “community focus group meetings”. A well worn cursory form of tick the box consultation. It would not involve consideration of the the key issue, that it is privacy invasive and affects children. Biometric information, which is what fingerprints are, is highly sensitive.
While it is supposedly designed to reduce vandalism, or more accurately identify potential culprits of vandalism, it is also going to be used to tackle vaping. Increasing the use for the fingerprints is a typical problem with these devices, they are used for many more activities that originally envisaged. Function creep will be just creepy.
This system is surveillance. Of children. Of their use of the toilets. Those records can be reviewed. The principal even admitted as much. It is to monitor student’s movements. That will involve keeping those records.
The story is covered by the ABC with Sydney high school uses fingerprint technology to stop vandalism in toilets and the Guardian with Sydney school’s use of fingerprint scanners in toilets an invasion of privacy, expert says.
The ABC story provides:
Students are being asked to scan their fingerprints during class time if they want to access the toilets at a school in south-west Sydney.
Moorebank High School implemented a biometric system in June after they say they spent thousands of dollars a year restoring vandalised bathrooms.
Year 11 student Daniel Scutella said the familiar site of smeared faeces stopped him from using the toilets, prompting him to wait until he could make it home.
“Often there’s been cases where people have thrown their poo on the ceiling,” he said.
“It happens a few times a year at least. It’s quite disgusting.”
He said other vandalism included urine on the floor and damage to the doors.
Most of the school’s 1,000 students have registered their fingerprints to use the bathrooms during class hours.
However, a Department of Education spokeswoman said the system is not compulsory.
“If students or parents prefer, students can also access the toilets during those times by obtaining an access card from the office,” she said.
“All parents were notified … via school newsletters and the minutes of community focus group meetings were also emailed to all parents.”
The school has received at least two complaints that are now being addressed by the school’s principal, Vally Grego.
The idea to implement a “fingerprint data collection system” was first raised by the school with parents as part of the Community Focus Group about two years ago.
The group of parents and faculty were apprehensive about using the biometric data of teenagers but eventually voted in favour, saying it was the least-invasive solution that could be trialled.
“It’s not like you can put cameras in there. You can’t put a security guard in there — that’s absurd,” said Julia Scutella, Daniel’s mother and president of the Community Focus Group.
“Once we started seeing it was the type of tech that has already been tried and tested before, and it’s not going to be obligatory, and it’s going to give some sense of control over an area that has such little control, then it’s worth giving a try.
“If we don’t do something and see what the results are, then we won’t know.”
Ms Grego wrote to parents just before the start of the term in a newsletter to let them know the system was being rolled out.
“The Posiflex kiosks do not store a copy of your fingerprint, it stores an alphanumerical representation of the fingerprint,” she said in June.
“We are introducing this system to monitor students’ movement during class time and to reduce the incidents of vandalism. We will then investigate the upgrade to the toilets.”
The school says the visitor log generated by the fingerprint system will help staff narrow down who is vandalising the school toilets, but the ABC understands the system will also aid in tackling the growing problem of students vaping during class time.
Daniel said the use of his fingerprint to access the toilets was worthwhile.
“I don’t mind it, [my fingerprint] doesn’t feel that important to me,” he said.
“It’s worth it if it can put a bit of responsibility on the people who are ruining it for the rest of the school, and I appreciate that.”
The Guardian story provides:
A Sydney high school’s decision to install fingerprint scanners at the entrance to toilets to track student movements and prevent vandalism has been criticised as “unreasonable and disproportionate” by a privacy expert.
Moorebank high school moved to install the scanners in term three, with the school’s principal, Vally Grego, telling parents it was a measure intended to reduce vandalism.
“The system will roll out in term three for the external student toilets only,” she wrote in a letter to parents earlier this year.
“We are introducing this system to monitor students’ movement during class time and to reduce the incidents of vandalism. We will then investigate the upgrade to the toilets.”
Students were asked to provide their fingerprint information for the system, with almost all of the 1,000 having already done so.
The system was introduced after two years of consultation with the school’s community focus group, and does not actually record a fingerprint. Instead, an alphanumeric representation of the fingerprint is created, with the information stored off site.
The system is not compulsory, with students able to access the toilets during class time by obtaining an access card from the office.
Samantha Floreani, the program lead at Digital Rights Watch, said preventing vandalism was not a good enough justification for what she calls an invasion of privacy.
“Students should have the right to go to the bathroom without having their biometric information collected, and [their] movements constantly monitored,” she said.
Floreani warned the risks posed by the system far outweigh any potential benefits.
“If there were to be a data breach, for example – if the information was to be accessed by someone who’s not authorised, or if there was a leak, or if there was a hack – then suddenly you’ve got a student fingerprint being accessed by people who shouldn’t have access to that information.
“And then that creates all kinds of risks for those students, for example, identity fraud, or it could potentially be linked with all kinds of other information.”
She said the move set a dangerous precedent for other schools, and “contributes to the normalisation of surveillance”.
A spokesperson for NSW Education said the school’s parent community was notified and consulted about the scanners “via a community focus group”.
“The decision to install the mechanism was ratified by this group on more than one occasion.
“All parents were notified. The information was disseminated to parents via school newsletters and the minutes of community focus group meetings were also emailed to all parents.”
