School District Hit With New Mac Spying Lawsuit 330
CWmike writes "A former student at a suburban Philadelphia high school has sued his school district for allegedly spying on him and his family using a school-issued Mac laptop, according to court documents. The Lower Merion School District of Ardmore, Pa. was first sued in February 2010 by another student using similar charges. That case, dubbed 'Spygate' in some reports, was settled last October when Lower Merion agreed to pay Blake Robbins $175,000 and cover $425,000 in court costs. On Monday, Joshua Levin, a 2009 graduate of Herriton High, charged the district with violating his civil rights and privacy by remotely activating the notebook's built-in camera to take photographs and screenshots. On Wednesday, Lower Merion spokesman Doug Young called Levin's lawsuit 'solely motivated by monetary interests and a complete waste of the taxpayer's dollars.' Levin begged to differ. According to his lawsuit, Lower Merion used his laptop to take more than 8,000 photographs and screenshots between September 2008 and March 2009. A district report uncovered more than 30,000 photographs and 27,000 screenshots taken. Last June, lawyers made photos and screenshots available for viewing by the 76 affected students. 'Plaintiff opted to view the recovered images, and was shocked, humiliated and severely emotionally distressed at what he saw,' Levin's lawsuit stated."
Re:The webcam light... (Score:5, Informative)
Answered in the article. The thought that the school district was spying on them was dismissed as ludicrous. And, in fairness, it is practically insane. Rather than lawsuits and payouts, though (which punishes the wrong people), I'd prefer just to fire everyone in management at the school.
Re:The webcam light... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The webcam light... (Score:4, Informative)
Unfortunately, they'll be protected as employees. The school board will take the heat for this one, and not without justification, seeing as someone at the very least had their head buried firmly up their asses.
Why should the school board allow this travesty of privacy? Let them suffer or have them recommend the firing of the guilty employees.
Re:The webcam light... (Score:4, Informative)
It is. All iSight cameras on Mac laptops have hardwired LEDs. You can't disable the light in software.
Re:The webcam light... (Score:4, Informative)
It's connected in-line with the physical power to the camera. If there is a voltage to the camera, the LED is lit.
Re:The webcam light... (Score:4, Informative)
Money?!? The perpetrators need to be in prison. Not county jail. Not weekend lockup. Not community service. Not probation. PRISON!
Re:The webcam light... (Score:4, Informative)
The power LED on my Amiga can be overridden (turned off). I can't think of any reason a Macintosh camera LED would be any different. If there's a will, there's a hack for it.
LED on the Macbook camera is in parallel with the power supply to the camera. Camera module power == LED ON.