K12 Student Data is Hacked and the Surveillance State

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WHAT TO DO — HOW TO FIX THIS

Federal Register :: Request for Public Comment on the Federal Trade Commission’s Implementation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule. Written comments must be received on or before October 23, 2019. The Commission will hold a public workshop to review the COPPA Rule on October 7, 2019. Write “COPPA Rule Review, 16 CFR part 312, Project No. P195404,” on your comment and file your comment online at https://www.regulations.gov by following the instructions on the web-based form. 
https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2019/07/25/2019-15754/request-for-public-comment-on-the-federal-trade-commissions-implementation-of-the-childrens-online

Send your comment and cite all the information below.

WHAT IS WRONG

#K12SurveillanceState #K12 Surveillance State

@AASA, The School Superintendents Association supports & develops school leaders, advocates for high-quality public education for all children

THERE ARE NO  CHIEF PRIVACY OFFICERS  IN K-12 EDUCATION

PRIVACY INFORMATION
Does K12 monitor your computer and How to Protect your Privacy Online

ETHICS — There isn’t a single school district with a K-12 CPO. In fact, it is still extremely rare for districts to hire even one full-time employee dedicated to privacy.
Student Privacy Bill Protection : No Parental Consent Needed for Data Mining
Anyone who tells you they don’t need privacy because they “have nothing to hide” is a sheep that will enable a total surveillance state. Just don’t do it. Privacies protect our basic human rights.

Report: K-12 Schools Experienced 122 Cyber Attacks in 2018
A new report from the K-12 Cybersecurity Resource Center says a U.S. school district falls victim to a cyber attack as often as every three days.

#google owns #YouTube violates children’s privacy

Google has secret webpages that feed your personal data to advertisers, report says – CNET
https://www.cnet.com/news/google-has-secret-webpages-that-feed-your-personal-data-to-advertisers-report-says/

COPPA can collect $42,530 per violation (which basically is per person it affected). $170M is fractions of pennies of a full fine. Those feels when @google has violated individuals’ privacy so many times it gets a comparison chart for fines against it:
https://twitter.com/wbm312/status/1169267237468819461

“This is the third time since 2011 that the FTC is sanctioning @Google for privacy. The FTC’s $136 million penalty makes for a great headline, but @Google will still pull in a profit for violating children’s privacy on @YouTube
https://twitter.com/chopraftc/status/1169245407949524992

Welcome to the K-12 Surveillance State – The New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/02/opinion/surveillance-state-schools.html

YouTube under federal investigation over allegations it violates children’s privacy https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/06/19/facing-federal-investigation-youtube-is-considering-broad-changes-childrens-content/

“The $170m @YouTube @FTC settlement is impressive as far as it goes, but I am concerned that it does not go far enough to ensure that child-directed content on YT will be treated lawfully under COPPA, so I dissented:
https://twitter.com/RKSlaughterFTC/status/1169260973242425347

Schools Are Deploying Digital Surveillance Systems
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20115092

States Are Ratcheting Up Reading Expectations For 3rd-Graders
https://www.npr.org/741156019

Elizabeth Warren unveils bill that could hold tech execs responsible for data breaches
https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/3/18293688/elizabeth-warren-facebook-amazon-google-apple-executives-jail-data-breaches

State refuses to release report on Frederick County Public Schools data breach
https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/education/schools/public_k-12/state-refuses-to-release-report-on-frederick-county-public-schools/article_5dcc5bc5-58ba-5930-bb3c-b77ef5c52ea0.html

The ‘Top 10’ K-12 Cyber Incidents of 2018
https://medium.com/@douglevin/the-top-10-k-12-cyber-incidents-of-2018-1a85eae9357a

Back-to-school malware is hiding in those digital textbooks
https://www.cnet.com/news/back-to-school-malware-is-hiding-in-those-digital-textbooks/

9/6/19 Schools in Arizona’s Flagstaff closed for second day due to cyberattack
https://thehill.com/policy/cybersecurity/460244-schools-in-arizonas-flagstaff-closed-for-second-day-due-to-cyber-attack

The Flagstaff Unified School District (FUSD), which includes 15 schools and more than 9,600 students, canceled classes on both Thursday and Friday after a ransomware virus was found on multiple servers. Preschools and child care centers within FUSD were also closed.  FUSD spokesman Zachery Fountain told The Hill the choice was made to sever internet connections at school facilities to contain the virus.

The K-12 Cybersecurity Resource Center
https://k12cybersecure.com/

Cyber security national project New York City is launching public cybersecurity tools to keep residents from getting hacked
https://techcrunch.com/2018/03/29/nyc-secure-new-york-cybersecurity-app-de-blasio/

Chinese Company Backs Out Of Controversial Choir College Purchase https://www.npr.org/737666425

I know the award winning and statewide respected journalist, Charlie Kratovil, who was invited to attend a charter school conference in New Jersey this week at which White House correspondent April Ryan keynoted, who was forcibly ejected during Ryan’s speech after his camera was seized. Another local journalist who retired from a career with a major newspapers when it downsized, reported on this event – which is both mysterious and highly disturbing as it reeks of media suppression.

https://www.bobbraunsledger.com/jersey-journalist-roughed-up-at-session-sponsored-by-charter-school-groups/

Jersey journalist roughed up at session sponsored by charter school groups

An independent New Jersey journalist was roughed up, his video camera was seized, and he was ejected from a New Brunswick conference sponsored by a number of pro-charter school organizations.

The incident involving Charles Kratovil of New Brunswick Today at last Saturday’s session of what was billed the “Fourth Annual New Jersey Parents Summit” was caught on tape. Kratovil said he was injured during the scuffle and will file criminal charges against a security guard for radio journalist April Ryan, a speaker at the conference. The tape shows Ryan assenting to the guard’s action against Kratovil shortly after she began to speak.

Another internet-based news organization– news franchise TAPInto–apparently did not consider interfering with the work of a journalist at a public event newsworthy. TAPInto reported on the speech that was interrupted by the incident involving Kratovill but did not mention the scuffle.

TAPInto has refused comment on its role (or lack of one) in the incident, apparently witnessed by its New Brunswick editor Chuck O’Donnell whose byline appears on that outlet’s account of Ryan’s speech. Ryan, the White House correspondent for American Urban Radio Networks (AURN), also refused comment.

Ryan, also a paid analyst for CNN, achieved considerable notoriety last year when she was criticized by President Donald Trump. According to The New York Times. Trump said:

“You talk about somebody that’s a loser; she doesn’t know what the hell she’s doing. She gets publicity, and then she gets a pay raise or a contract with, I think, CNN. But she’s very nasty. And she shouldn’t be. She shouldn’t be. You’ve got to treat the White House and the office of the presidency with respect.”

Ryan says she has had to hire security guards because of death threats that followed her run-in with Trump. She did not mention that at Saturday’s meeting when she apparently had Kratovil removed.

It’s not clear why Kratovil was singled out for attention.

The videotape–just as Kratovil’s camera was seized– shows her explaining she does not allow videotaping of her public comments because she “like(s) to have an unfettered discussion.” The website of the conference sponsor, however, carries a videotape of remarks she made at a different session of the two-day meeting.

Kratovil, who publishes New Brunswick Today, is a well-known journalist in New Brunswick. He considers his media outlets–a website, a Twitter account, a You Tube channel, and an infrequent hard-copy newspaper–to be part of journalism’s “hyper-local” movement, replacing the many defunct or stripped-down local newspapers that once served New Brunswick and the surrounding area.

Despite his proclivity for occasionally making news–he ran for mayor and often speaks at public meetings–Kratovil is a professional journalist and has won awards for his work.

The 33-year-old journalist covers a wide variety of aspects of life in the university town–personal, political, and educational. He explains he was not especially interested in the topics covered in the conference, including charter schools. He wanted to meet a White House correspondent and introduce her to his followers.

“It’s just not every day a White House correspondent comes to New Brunswick,” he says. “I wanted to get it on videotape and run it on our YouTube channel.”

He says he never intended to write a story about the conference or the conference sponsors. New Brunswick Today published only one story about charter schools in the last few years–and his outlet has not taken an editorial position on them.

Kratovil provides a service and a product needed in a city like New Brunswick. In providing that service, he should not be mistreated by anyone–especially not another journalist. No journalist should.

While much is known about Kratovil, less is known of the “Fourth Annual New Jersey Parent Summit.” The conference was organized by an entity called “Project Ready,” founded and operated by Shenell McCloud, the state “director of advocacy” for KIPP Schools, a chain of charter schools that flourished in Newark under state control during the tenure of former GOP Gov. Chris Christie.

The conference program and website suggests the meeting was aimed at parents active in urban school districts. Several pro-charter speakers were listed in the program.

Organizers said about 300 people attended the weekend conference, about 200 of whom apparently purchased tickets to the affair–or had tickets purchased for them; the rest were invited guests, including state and local politicians and US Rep. Donald Payne Jr. (D-10th), who introduced Ryan. Pro-charter members of the Newark school board did speak, according to the program.

The roster of sponsors included the New Jersey organizations most active in the privatization of public schools–the New Jersey Charter School Association; Better Education for Kids, Inc (B4K); JerseyCan; KIPP-NJ; iLearn Schools; Parents for Great Camden Schools; the BRICK Education Network, and others.

“It was a little odd,” says Kratovil. “Obviously, there were many people there who seemed to be involved in charter schools, including a lot of parents whose kids attend but there wasn’t actually much talk about charter schools.”

From what he says and from the descriptions on organizational websites, the point of the conference was to introduce local parent organizers to local politicians, primarily from New Jersey’s major cities.

MIek DuHaime–his firm cooperated with Kravotil, gave no hint of trouble to come.
But–none of this explains why Kratovil was so unwelcome. The journalist posted e-mail exchanges with the public relations firm hired to create media interest in the conference, Mercury Public Affairs, LLC, a political consulting firm. One of its best-known partners is Mike DuHaime, the chief strategist for Christie’s unsuccessful presidential campaign.

The Mercury publicists were happy to have Kratovil at the conference.
New Brunswick Today had published an advance article on Ryan’s appearance–an event that drew no interest from mainstream media. On Saturday, Mercury employee Will Herberich helped him set up his video camera.

“Everyone was very polite,” says Kratovil. “I was too. I made sure my camera didn’t get in anyone’s way. I had no idea something like this was going to happen.”

He had taped about 90 minutes of the conference when Payne rose to introduce Ryan and Ryan began to speak.

It immediately became clear something was wrong. Ryan and an unidentified man clearly were troubled by Kratovil’s camera. The man, later identified only as out-of-state “security” for Ryan, heads toward the camera.

The camera obviously is forcefully removed. Audio from the scene depicts the argument between the man and Kratovil.

In a series of tweets posted on his Twitter account, Kratovil recounts in detail–with photos–how someone grabbed the camera and took it out of the room, followed by Kratovil demanding the man stop what he is doing. You can see the entire thread here:

Kratovil had every right to be where he was. Ryan, who has complained about the way the Trump White House treats her, did to Kravotil what Trump tried to do to her.

Worse, really–no one physically touched Ryan, no one took away her tape recorder, no one ejected her from the White House. Trump just criticized her–and that certainly hasn’t–and won’t–hurt her career.

She’s a hero to the press. Or was.

Last April, she was awarded a “Freedom of the Press” award from the Reporters’ Committee for Freedom of the Press.

Maybe the committee will give the same award to Kratovil next year. Ryan should nominate him. And he deserves it.

Kimi Wei | The Wei LLC
ki**@th****.com