Big Brother is alive and well in the Lower Marion School District of suburban Philadelphia, Pa.
Some 2,620 Apple laptops issued to pupils contained built-in remote-controlled web cameras used by school administrators to spy on students at home.
Installed to assist in recovery of stolen computers, the web-cams instead were used to monitor juveniles in violation of the Fourth Amendment and privacy laws.
One student, whose parents have filed a class-action suit against the district, was actually accused by an assistant principal of taking drugs--based on a web-cam photo printout of the l5-year-old munching pill-shaped candy.
Shades of l984. And don't even think about what else the educator-voyeurs saw in student bedrooms as the teens of both genders "accessed school-based resources."
Adolescents don't even like using common showers or undressing in front of peers. Imagine their chagrin at someone seeing them using dildos or spanking their monkeys while surfing the Information Highway.
And isn't peeping at naked persons a sex offense? Shouldn't the school officials be charged with accessing child porn?
Shame. (28 FEBRUARY 2010)