PRIVACY + SECURITY BLOG

News, Developments, and Insights

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5 Things School Officials Must Know About Privacy

Video 5 Things School Officials Must Know About Privacy

by Daniel J. Solove I have produced a new short video called 5 Things School Officials Must Know About Privacy.  The video addresses the most important points that school officials should know when it comes to privacy. These points are: Protecting privacy involves much more than following FERPA. Just because software and services can do […]

The Year in Privacy 2013 and the Year to Come

by Daniel J. Solove 2013 was a remarkable year in privacy developments. Here are four main trends I saw occurring this year: 1. The heat on the NSA for its broad surveillance programs has been sustained and productive. The Edward Snowden leaks revealed massive NSA surveillance efforts. What is most interesting in the aftermath of […]

Why Schools Are Flunking Privacy and How They Can Improve

by Daniel J. Solove Fordham School of Law’s Center on Law and Information Policy (CLIP), headed by Joel Reidenberg, has released an eye-opening and sobering study of how public schools are handling privacy issues with regard to cloud computing. The study is called Privacy and Cloud Computing in Public Schools, and it is well worth […]

Privacy and Data Security in Higher Education

by Daniel J. Solove I was recently interviewed in HR Horizons, the magazine of the National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO) on the topic of privacy and data security in higher education. Here are a few excerpts: What is the difference between data security and data privacy, and what risks do each […]

Higher Education Needs Privacy Officers and Privacy/Security Training

In 2007, Seung Cho, a student at Virginia Tech, killed 32 students and faculty and wounded 17. He then committed suicide. One of the most troublesome things about this incident was that it might have been prevented if school officials and employees had a better grasp of privacy law. Appointed by the state governor, the […]

Student Privacy in Peril: Massive Data Gathering With Inadequate Privacy and Security

TeachPrivacy Ad Privacy Training Security Training 01

In October, personal financial data — including social security numbers, loan repayment histories and bank-routing numbers – of thousands of college students was exposed on the Department of Education’s (ED) direct loan website. For seven minutes, anyone surfing the direct loan website could find personal information about students who had borrowed from the Department of […]

Should Teachers Be Banned from Communicating with Students Online?

Education Privacy

Increasingly, states and school districts are struggling over how to deal with teachers who communicate with students online via social network websites.  One foolish way to address the issue is via strict bans, such as a law passed in Missouri earlier this year that attempted to ban teachers from friending students on social network websites.  […]