Updates coming... new developments

Since I started this blog over 10 years ago the state of surveillance, monitoring and application of biometric technology used in schools on our children, the next generation, has increased beyond imagination.  Okay, there may be arguments that his 'improves' their education, enables better educational analysis, reduce admin time/costs, etc... but personally, I've not seen a dramatic increase in the next generations intellectual ability or schools being more affluent because of technology.  Certainly here in the UK we currently have a national funding crisis in education. 

Credit: https://www.pinterest.co.uk
/pin/68539225552401806/

It is a different education that is needed for today's kids.  Access to information is greater to an individual than ever before.  Knowing and retaining information in this age maybe is not a necessity as much as it was.  Moreover how to apply that knowledge in this ever changing society perhaps is a skill children should learn.  Discernment, where one's digital footprint is left and the data left again one's digital identity should also be considered.  How, who and what may be assumed by a children's online activities on the Internet - and within a school network - is a burgeoning area that needs urgent consideration, especially for those it could potentially affect in decades to come. 

With governments, private education tech companies and private companies running schools having access to individual educational data from the age of 2 years old (in the UK) to 19 and beyond gives an enormous potential for profiling.  I could write about this for an age, as these are all points that have been raised with the proliferation of technology in education for the past decade plus.

What to do?  I have been absent somewhat from blogging here as the transfer of biometric technology tested used on children in the UK has now widened into the rest of society.  My concern is when the state uses biometric technology without consent, much as schools did from 2001 - 2013 in the UK.  I set up a sister blog a couple of years ago to keep the two developments of biometric technology, schools / wider society, separate - see my State of Surveillance website.

However, there is now an issue of facial recognition creeping into US and Chinese schools for a variety of reasons.  Here in England and Wales (not Scotland or Northern Ireland) facial recognition is not viably an option for schools with under 18 year olds, as per the consent required under the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012.   The argument for the use of biometrics in schools - whether  fingerprint or facial recognition - is basically unproven, as other, less invasive, less 'valuable', means of identification will suffice.   This is an issue I intend to raise again here.

So, hopefully, (in a rather large nutshell) I've explained my absence and fully intend at least once a week to start again back here.   T'will be nice to get back to it!

Schools obligations to students biometric data

It's that time of year again, when parents with children going up to high schools are encountering biometric systems in their children's new schools and are unsure of their rights to consent and what responsibilities the school has to ensure school services are not withheld from students who do not participate in their biometric system.  Hopefully this will clarify schools, parents and children's position.  A PDF version can be found here.

A school’s responsibility

A school cannot take and process a student’s, under 18 years old, biometric data without the consent of the parent/s or the student.  Consent must be given in writing from the parent/s.  Consent can be withdrawn at any time.

CONSENT

·         If one parent consents and the other does not, the non-consent takes precedence. 

·         If the parent/s consent and the student does not, the students non-consent takes precedence. 

·         If the parent/s do not consent and the student does consent, the parents non-consent takes precedence.

If a consent is not given the school “must ensure that reasonable alternative means are available by which the child may do, or be subject to, anything which the child would have been able to do, or be subject to, had the child’s biometric information been processed.” as detailed in the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012,Chapter 2 Section 26 (7).

Parents

Parent/s must be informed by the school that they are using a biometric system and the school must gain written consent from the parent/s to take and process their child’s biometric data.  You may withdraw your consent at any time.

Schools do not always make it clear when asking for consent that an alternative to the biometric system is available and that non-consent ultimately lies with the student.

Students

Regardless of consent given by your parent/s you alone determine whether a school takes and processes your biometric data.   If you choose not to use a biometric system the school must provide an alternative and must not withhold any services from you that is available through their biometric system.  You may withdraw your consent at any time.

Legal advice for schools that feel the need to use children's biometric data

If UK schools feel the need to process children's biometric data they should take note of this very informative piece of legal advice from Browne Jacobson.  Schools cannot discriminate against pupils who are not participating in a biometric database and must offer an alternative.

My child has been home educated for the period of their high school education and recently entered back into mainstream education, now attending the local college to do AS levels.  The college botched an attempt to gain parental consent for a new biometric system, introduced September 2014 to make the college 'cashless'.  They swept the consent for biometrics into the medical and school trip consent.  Needless to say the college was informed how the consent process works after I did not sign the consent for anything.

My child can still eat as he is identified via his photograph on the school system.  We parents have to transfer money to the student account for him to pay for this.  We don't as...

• It is a hassle to transfer money - I do not need 'another' thing to do online
• I do not want a digital record to be held of his eating habits
• I am not certain where that information goes
• Food from the local sandwich shop is cheaper, fresher and it feeds the local economy

He, along with his friends, enjoys the fresh air of lunch time walking to the local sandwich shop to eat.  However, my child is still discriminated against in the college as he is unable to use the biometric vending machines (which in itself may not be a bad thing given the food contained).  I will be following this up with the college as a point.

Interestingly, through hearsay from students attending the college, the biometric system has been an epic fail with many students not participating.  Apparently the lunch sales have to dipped to only 11% of what it was previously, so much so that the lure of a mountain bike has been offer to those students buying a 'meal deal' with their fingerprint - their name goes into the draw for the bike.  Pavlovian?

I just wonder who is paying for this incentive to fingerprint the students?

Florida introduces three bills for biometrics in schools

After the appalling iris scanning of 750 Florida school children in May 2013, without their parents knowledge, to get on a school bus Senator Dorothy Hukill introduced two bills to the Florida Senate, SB232 and SB188 dealing with biometrics in schools.

SB232 would simply prohibit schools from taking and processing students biometrics whilst SB188 would allow schools or school districts to set policies on how biometric technology could be used.

“And the parents have to opt in, give permission for the information to be taken from their child,” Hukill said of SB188.

“Who would even think a school would take this kind of information from children?” Hukill said. “We've had children get on buses and go through lunch lines for years without taking their biometric information. Why do we need to do this? And if we are going to do this then why not have a policy in effect?”

Good questions indeed Senator Hukill!  

On 21st October 2013 Senator Jake Raburn introduced House Bill HB195 - 'Provides that students & parents have certain rights relating to submission of biometric information; requires school district that collects student biometric information to implement policies governing collection & use of information; requires security of information & notification if security is breached; provides penalties'  - which is a near replica of SB188.

It will be interesting to see the bills journey through the senate.  Here is a brief explanation of the difference between Senate Bills and House Bills.

A parent's communication with school implementing biometrics

This month a concerned parent wrote to her child's school after finding out the school was planning to implement a biometric system.  She has kindly allowed the communications to be published so other parents wanting to use any of the information, the Freedom of Information request or the letter, sent to the school can see some questions to ask and points to consider.

Freedom of Information request sent to a school implementing a biometric system and a Letter raising concerns and links to aspects for the school to consider.

The law changes here in the UK.  Come September 2013 schools must have the written signature of one parent and the consent of the child in order to process a students biometric data. 

In light of this the UK Department of Education published these guidelines and template letters for schools to use in light of the pending leglislation:
Protection of Biometric Information of Children in Schools.
Government response to the consultation on draft advice on protection of information of children in schools

Biometrics at Blacon

Blacon High School, West Cheshire, UK, implemented a fingerprint biometric catering system in June last year, 2012.

A letter was sent out Tuesday 12th June telling parents that the system would be going 'live' the following Thursday of the next week, 21st June.  With Blacon High School taking the children's biometrics on Monday 18th June.

That gave parents just 3 - 4 working days to read the letter (we parents do not always read letters the day we get them), do some research into biometrics in schools (which throws up a myriad of issues) and contact the school if they did "not want your child to be included in the system".

Mmmm... a hurried state of affairs here it seems.  Blacon High School's speedy communication in relation to biometric registration is very similar to how other schools have operated.

In most instances of parents contacting this blog and the Leave Them Kids Alone site, this type of hurried biometric implementation has also been experienced.  One could argue that this method allows less time for parental objection, so that a higher, more covert, proportion of pupil biometric take up is ensured.

Certainly in my experience more than 3 working days notice is commonly given for normal school activities, dates to be put in diaries, to allow consent for school trips, food tasting, swimming, collection of monies, vaccinations, sports days, etc.

Not so in this instance.

Understandably some parents and the wider community were shocked at the notion of schools taking, storing and processing their children's biometrics - and at Blacon High School's speedy implementation of the fingerprint biometric system.

This resulted in articles and letters in the local papers with parents contacting political parties for support and accountability.  Parents have taken legal advice, set up a Facebook Group "Refuse to use" and are contacting the wider community to spead awareness and gather support against the biometric system.

Apart from all the privacy and civil liberties issues surrounding children submitting their biometrics for school functions, as this blog has detailed before, the question has to be asked:

Why would a school with 449 pupils (see 6th March  2012 Ofsted Inspection) buy a biometric system in 2012 when come September 2013 all UK schools have to by law, as detailed in the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, collect one parental signature per child to enable the school to take and process a child's biometrics?

Why is there no mention of the new biometric system on Blacon High School's website or their Data Protection Register entry?  See the Information Commissioner's Office quote about the register "The main purpose of the public register is transparency and openness".

Not only does Blacon High School have to collect one parent's signature in order to collect a child's biometric data but the school has to be seen to make an effort to contact both parents.  In Blacon High School's case 998 parents for the new cashless catering system and the school need to also have in place a duplicate, alternative system for those parents and children who do not consent.

How efficient is that a spend of our UK tax payers monies?  Two systems.  A bad school management decision? Who is accountable?

On a lighter note...

What is betting that Blacon High School give parents more than 3 - 4 working days to give their written consent in order for the school to run their newly purchased biometric system?   If one child's biometric data resides on Blacon High School's biometric system without a signed parental consent form come September 1st 2013, the school will be breaking the law,

I suspect there may be a few eyes watching how Blacon High School complies with the forthcoming enforceable legislation over the coming months.  I think more to come on this.

Parental consent now a legal requirement in UK

In May 2012 the Protection of Freedoms Act was given Royal Assent and passed into law in the UK.  Chapter 2 of the Act, clauses 26-28, deals with consent when processing a child's biometric data:

Chapter 2 Protection of biometric information of children in schools etc.
26. Requirement to notify and obtain consent before processing biometric information
27 Exceptions and further provision about consent and notification
28. Interpretation

The salient points of the Act are: 

• Each parent of the child should be notified by the relevant authority that they are planning to process their child's biometrics and notified that they are able to object.  
• In order for a school to process children's biometrics at least one parent must consent and no parent has withdrawn consent. This needs to be in writing.
• The child can object to the processing of their biometrics regardless of parents consent.
• The child is under 18 years old.

The requirement for parental consent as defined in this Act becomes enforceable In September 2013.

The UK is the first country in the world to address the issues of informing parents and requiring their consent when their children’s biometrics are being taken, stored and processed by a school or any such institution.

Further scrutiny will be needed to see how enforceable this law is and how 'informed' parental consent is.  Informed consent is a complex issue.  If the biometric vendor, as the sole supplier of information via the school to the parent, is the sole source of information that the school gives to the parent, fully informed consent could be questionable.

It is interesting to note that not one academic, educationalist, industry developer have given their support for children using biometrics, in fact many experts have have voiced their concerns.  Only biometric vendors and schools seems to think biometrics use without parental consent with children is acceptable.  I know whose advice I'd take.

It's a good job that if parents Google "Biometrics in Schools" then this blog appears on Google's first results page.  Parents should also check out the Leave them Kids Alone website.

Children's Biometrics in the House of Lords

The Protection of Freedoms Bill had it's second reading in the House of Lords last week and some peers spoke in a positive manner about gaining consent of parents before schools take and process children's biometrics.

Lord Henley -

"it is right that parents should be asked to make an informed decision about whether to accede to the processing of such information. It is also proper that pupils should have a say."

The Lord Bishop of Bristol -

"I back the protection of biometric information on children in schools, with parental consent being required for processing information"

Lord Kennedy of Southwark -

 "Proposals regarding the express parental consent for the use of children's fingerprints are welcome"

The Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) tweeted that "Pleased to see Lord Lucas supporting ASCL's objections to restricting biometrics in schools in yday's Lord's debate. http://t.co/TlxwoxxR"

As the ASCL rightly state there was one peer, Lord Lucas, who indeed spoke of the section on biometrics in school as a "daffy overreaction".  (daffy?)  Lord Lucas also commented that biometrics in schools...

"...have great benefits. They improve safety. They improve privacy. They greatly improve efficiency."

If biometrics in schools do have such above beneficial effects what has the ASCL or Lord Lucas to be frightened about gaining parental consent.  Surely given the above claims, parents should willingly embrace this technology and thereby give consent.  Schools gain consent for all manner of activities, it is a process they are familiar with.

I would be interested to see validation of Lord Lucas's claims.  Claims that remind me of the previous Labour Government waffle justifying using childrens biometrics in schools for mundane tasks, and of course, claims made by companies selling access, registration and security systems to schools.

Freedom Bill 2010-11

The Protection of Freedoms Bill was introduced in the House of Commons this morning and part of the BIll, Part 1 (Chapter 2) includes provisions to protect the biometric data of children in schools and colleges.

The Bill outlines the "Requirement for consent before processing biometric information" of children up to 18 years old.

A law pertaining to children using biometrics has been a long time coming and the whole Bill, including the regulation of biometric technologies and children, needs to be got right.  It will be an interesting few months ahead.

Millions being spent on biometric systems

I love Google! Type in "biometric cashless catering contracts" and on the first results page alone we have over £4.5 million pounds spent by two Local Authorities on schools biometric systems, as recently dated as December 2010.

Staffordshire Council have a 24 month contract worth £4 million of our tax payers money to dish out to the lucky winner and Warrington Borough Council are tendering for £259,500, quite paltry in light of Staffordshire's school biometric budget.

I wonder if anyone has told these Councils or schools about the forthcoming legislation that means parental consent will be compulsory in order to use a childs biometric detail... why not put an added job, the school has to do, into the equation? - that makes sense!

Freedom Bill

Thursday 13 January 2011 - Children Fingerprinting

Question - Asked by Lord Taylor of Warwick (Lords Hansard text from 13th Jan 2011)

To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will end the compulsory fingerprinting of children at school without parental permission.[HL5389]

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Hill of Oareford): The Government intend to introduce legislation in the Freedom Bill to ensure that no children's biometric data are taken in schools or colleges without parental permission.

Hansard Link here: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201011/ldhansrd/text/110113w0001.htm#11011367000056

Movement ahead

Well, the blog has been quiet here but there is, and has been, some movement behind the scenes - more hopefully by the end of the week...

Iowa rejects the re-introduction of fingerprint scanners in schools

Des Moines Register, Iowa, USA, reports the bills that are up for debate, and therefore possible legislation, and those that are not to be debated and made into law.

"...state lawmakers pushed dozens of bills through committee, saving them from today's so-called "funnel" deadline. The week is a pivotal time for legislation. Bills that made the deadline will be debated. Those that failed the funnel are done."

Biometric fingerprint scanners in schools didn't make it through the 'funnel'.

LIKELY DEAD

FINGERPRINT SCANNERS: Some schools want to be able to use fingerprint scanners to speed children through lunch lines, the library checkout and bus boarding. State lawmakers outlawed the devices for school use in 2005 amid concerns about legal issues, privacy and information hacking. And this idea was stripped from Senate Study Bill 3010 this year.

Arizona Senate bill bans biometrics in schools

Arizona, USA, have a bill SB1216 banning biometrics in schools, details below and here is the 'fact sheet' of the bill.

It heartening that people are taking on board the issues that arise with the, increasingly obvious, inappropriate use of biometric technology with children in schools.

When it was reported that Espiritu community schools in Phoenix, USA, fingerprinted children, without informing parents, in mid January 2008 it taken a little over a month for this bill to happen.

I hope this speedy action shames our Labour UK Members of Parliament to act as the elected people of Arizona have, i.e. working the people that elected them - although I'm not holding my breath.

Well done to mum, Shirley Wallace, Arizona State Sen. Karen Johnson and State Rep. Andy Biggs, the others that supported this bill and Fred Bellemy, a Phoenix attorney who specializes in Technology Law for their efforts to bring this bill about in such a short amount of time.

REFERENCE TITLE: schools; biometric information; prohibition

State of Arizona Senate, Forty-eighth Legislature, Second Regular Session 2008

SB 1216

Introduced by
Senators Johnson, Blendu: Gray C, Harper; Representative Pearce

AN ACT

amending Title 15, chapter 1, article 1, Arizona Revised Statutes, by adding section 15-107; relating to school pupils.

Be it enacted by the Legislature of the State of Arizona:
Section 1. Title 15, chapter 1, article 1, Arizona Revised Statutes, is amended by adding section 15-107, to read:

START_STATUTE 15-107. Biometric information; prohibition; definition

A. School districts and charter schools shall not collect biometric information from pupils.

B. For the purposes of this section, "biometric information" means any information that is collected through an identification process for individual persons based on unique behavioral or physiological characteristics, including fingerprints, hand geometry, voice recognition, facial recognition, iris scans or retinal scans. END_STATUTE

Arizona to propose leglislation for schools fingerprinting children

After Espiritu community schools in Phoenix, USA, fingerprinted children without even notifying parents to allegedly shorten lunch queues parents were rightly outraged.

Parent Shirley Wallace was outraged when she found out what happened to her kids at school. "Since when does anyone have the right to fingerprint our children, especially without parents' permission?"

Fred Bellamy is a Phoenix attorney who specializes in Technology Law. He says fingerprinting children without parental consent is sending the wrong message.

"Once the data are captured," Bellamy says, "No matter what kind of promises the vendor may make, there is a serious risk. And I think the parents have every reason to be concerned about how this data will ultimately be used."

The schools, yet again, quote the old 'it's not a fingerprint but a string of numbers...' blerb.

Fingerprints can be reconstructed from number strings, see here, however as state fingerprint databases are increasingly algorithmic it does matter or not if a fingerprint is stored as the numbers stored operate in the same way a fingerprint does. It is a biometric marker of the child using the scanner.

As a consequence "Arizona State Sen. Karen Johnson and State Rep. Andy Biggs plan to propose legislation this session. The bill would require schools to get parent’s' permission before fingerprinting any child."

Good for them.

Leeds pupils bullied to give up their prints

A parent from Leeds forwarded both myself and Leave Them Kids Alone details of how their 11 year old son's new school dealt with her concerns over a biometric lunch system, installed over the summer break.

The vendors of the lunch system treated the children without respect, the schools evaded questions, she got told by the bio-company "It is the law, it was passed in parliament in June this year. If you don't believe me, I can prove it" (what?!) and some courageous pupils refused on human rights grounds - good for them!

The email in full is on the LTKA [link temporarily removed] site, but here are some parts of the email that, quite frankly, makes my blood boil in the way the children were treated - but yet an admirable response in their stanse:

(parent) ...I had a telephone conversation with a very bright young girl who also attends this school. She refused to have her fingerprints taken, as did her friend. (Their human rights decision - she said) They have also heard of a few others who have refused too. They didn't agree with the way that the system had been sneaked into school and with no parental consent form. They were very scared, yet refused to cooperate. They were then threatened with the isolation unit, no school trips and wouldn't be allowed to enter into the school without the prints.

But.... my point is, they still refused! The girl said that many of her friends were very scared, they didn't like it and didn't want to have it done, yet they were still bullied into it (........ including her younger brother)

She said that they rounded up the kids like sheep for the slaughter, doing all the youngest first. The teenagers who are in their final year of school are going to be fingerprinted tomorrow. (14/09/2007) She also mentioned that apart from the science teachers, all the other teachers were completely in the dark about what was going on.

Courageous kids eh? bless em :-)

And this cashless system is supposed to 'prevent 'bullying eh?... the schools implementation of this scheme, in itself, raises some very serious questions!

New US legislation halts school fingerprint technology

This from the Chicago Tribune:

Shortly after rolling out a new lunch program that allows pupils to pay for hot meals with a scan of their fingerprint, Wilmette school officials put the system on hold after learning that a new Illinois law limits the use of biometric information to protect children's privacy.

Illinois General Assembly SB1702, specifically dealing with school biometric databases, came into effect on the 1st August this year.

Adam Denenberg, the school district's director of technology and media is quoted in the article saying, "...no fingerprints are stored or could be obtained by police."

However, a child's biometric fingerprint algorithm, stored on a school database, can be accessed by police, as SB1702, section 5(B), on page 4, details:

(5) A prohibition on the sale, lease, or other disclosure of biometric information to another person or entity, unless:

(B) the disclosure is required by court order.

USA installs school scanners over summer break

States in the USA have taken advantage of the summer break by installing fingerprint biometric scanner for lunches, in Ohio, Florida, West Virginia and Maryland.

Kathy Thomas, at Gilpin Manor Elementary school, said in this article some parents objections to the new system might be based on inaccurate information.

Mmm...based on her view I'd say she is the one inaccurately educated about the fingerprint systems. See these international computer expert's views on using school biometric systems.

She says, “The new system uses a student’s fingerprint to create a corresponding identification number based on certain unique points of the print,” she said. “But it’s not actually recording the fingerprint itself, and we’re not storing anyone’s fingerprints in our computers.” - Yes you are. It's a digital biometric identifier of a child's fingerprint, not noseprint, earprint or footprint - it's a fingerprint - law enforcement and governments use similiar biometric systems because it stores a "fingerprint".

This picture accompanied the article, let's see... there clearly is a computer with an image of a fingerprint on it, the print is recorded initially and a biometric identifier of the child's fingerprint is stored that is absolutely unique to that child and can be used in law i.e, Police can access school biometric databases if they wish.

Kathy Thomas then goes on to say.. "School officials, for instance, cannot provide law enforcement with a copy of a student’s fingerprint from the system because no actual prints are recorded." Wrong - I don't know about US law but certainly in the UK police are able to access a school biometric database, if they believe it will help solve a crime, without parental knowledge.

With regard to the USA, interestingly CSI NY , the tv series, (I think series 3 episode 10 entitled "Sweet 16") ran a sub-plot where a teenage girl was joyriding in a car and non of the fingerprints in the car were on the police database (AFIS). The school had a biometric database and the CSI squad ran it through the school database to check the print and found the joyrider via that.

Leave Them Kids Alone statement

David Clouter of Leave Them Kids Alone has posted via the OurKingdom blog:

"School systems store fingerprint templates, the lifelong key to a person’s identity. Within 10 years these will be used to authenticate bank accounts and passports. World-renowned security experts argue that schools cannot possibly hold these securely and Microsoft identity Architect Kim Cameron has said that “It is absolutely premature to begin using conventional biometrics in schools”."

The Leave Them Kids Alone website is a great resource for parents to check out what is happening in the UK, USA or internationally regarding schools digitally fingerprinting children with or without parental consent or knowledge.

Illinios Act, USA, HB 1559

Act HB 1559 in Illinios, USA, regarding biometrics in schools should take effect 1st August 2007.
(If the above link is broken for HB1559 scroll down on the right column to 'Legal/Law' on this blog for the link)