<
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2023/06/student-monitoring-tools-should-not-flag-lgbtq-keywords>
"One of the more dangerous features of student monitoring tools like
GoGuardian, Gaggle, and Bark is their “flagging” functionality. The tools can
scan web pages, documents in students’ cloud drives, emails, video content, and
more for keywords about topics like sex, drugs, and violence. They then either
block or flag this content for review by school administrators.
But in practice, these flags don’t work very well—many of the terms flagged by
these student monitoring applications are often ambiguous, implicating whole
swathes of the net that contain benign content. Worse still, these tools can
alert teachers or parents to content that indicates something highly personal
about the student—like the phrase “am I gay”—in a context that implies such a
phrase is dangerous. Numerous reports show that the regular flagging of LGBTQ+
content creates a harmful atmosphere for students, some of whom have been outed
because of it. This is particularly problematic when school personnel or family
members do not understand or support a queer identity.
Thankfully, some student monitoring software companies have heard the concerns
of students and civil liberties groups. Gaggle recently removed LGBTQ+ terms
from their keyword list, and GoGuardian has done the same, per our
correspondence with the company. We commend these companies for improving their
keyword lists—it’s a good step forward, though not nearly enough to solve the
general problem of over-flagging by the apps. In our research, LGBTQ+ resources
are still commonly flagged for containing words like ‘sex,’ ‘breasts,’ or
‘vagina.’
Though these tools are intended to detect signs that a student may be at-risk
of depression, self-harm, suicide, bullying, or violence, their primary use is
disciplinary. Eighty-nine percent of teachers say their schools use some form
of student monitoring software, which has a greater negative impact on students
from low-income families, black students, hispanic students, and those with
learning differences. And as we’ve written before, combined with the
criminalization of reproductive rights, and an increasing number of anti-trans
laws, software that produces and forwards data—sometimes to police—about what
young people type into their laptops is a perfect storm of human rights
abuses."
Via Rixty Dixet.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
