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94-520: "Electronic communications" means any transfer of signs, signals, writing, images, sounds, data , or intelligence of any nature transmitted in whole or in part by a wire, radio , electromagnetic , photoelectronic or photooptic system that affects interstate or foreign commerce , but excludes the following: Title I of the ECPA protects wire, oral, and electronic communications while in transit. It sets down requirements for search warrants that are more stringent than in other settings. Title II of

188-416: A YouTube video he produced, saying: "It's ... just a fantastic feature ... especially when you're in a school environment". Perbix maintained a personal blog in which he discussed computer oversight techniques, including how to cloak remote monitoring so it is invisible to the user. On August 11, 2008, weeks before the district handed the laptops out to students, a Harriton High School student interning in

282-488: A mass noun in singular form. This usage is common in everyday language and in technical and scientific fields such as software development and computer science . One example of this usage is the term " big data ". When used more specifically to refer to the processing and analysis of sets of data, the term retains its plural form. This usage is common in the natural sciences, life sciences, social sciences, software development and computer science, and grew in popularity in

376-436: A basis for calculation, reasoning, or discussion. Data can range from abstract ideas to concrete measurements, including, but not limited to, statistics . Thematically connected data presented in some relevant context can be viewed as information . Contextually connected pieces of information can then be described as data insights or intelligence . The stock of insights and intelligence that accumulate over time resulting from

470-411: A breath and relax. DiMedio then forwarded the e-mails to District Network Technician Perbix, who suggested a further response to the student intern. With DiMedio's approval, Perbix e-mailed the student intern, also dismissing the student's concern: [T]his feature is only used to track equipment ... reported as stolen or missing. The only information that this feature captures is IP and DNS info from

564-584: A climber's guidebook containing practical information on the best way to reach Mount Everest's peak may be considered "knowledge". "Information" bears a diversity of meanings that range from everyday usage to technical use. This view, however, has also been argued to reverse how data emerges from information, and information from knowledge. Generally speaking, the concept of information is closely related to notions of constraint, communication, control, data, form, instruction, knowledge, meaning, mental stimulus, pattern , perception, and representation. Beynon-Davies uses

658-404: A common view, data is collected and analyzed; data only becomes information suitable for making decisions once it has been analyzed in some fashion. One can say that the extent to which a set of data is informative to someone depends on the extent to which it is unexpected by that person. The amount of information contained in a data stream may be characterized by its Shannon entropy . Knowledge

752-668: A description of other data. A similar yet earlier term for metadata is "ancillary data." The prototypical example of metadata is the library catalog, which is a description of the contents of books. Whenever data needs to be registered, data exists in the form of a data document . Kinds of data documents include: Some of these data documents (data repositories, data studies, data sets, and software) are indexed in Data Citation Indexes , while data papers are indexed in traditional bibliographic databases, e.g., Science Citation Index . Gathering data can be accomplished through

846-553: A few decades. Scientific publishers and libraries have been struggling with this problem for a few decades, and there is still no satisfactory solution for the long-term storage of data over centuries or even for eternity. Data accessibility . Another problem is that much scientific data is never published or deposited in data repositories such as databases . In a recent survey, data was requested from 516 studies that were published between 2 and 22 years earlier, but less than one out of five of these studies were able or willing to provide

940-486: A huge uproar. DiMedio responded: [T]here is absolutely no way that the District Tech people are going to monitor students at home. ... If we were going to monitor student use at home, we would have stated so. Think about it—why would we do that? There is no purpose. We are not a police state . ... There is no way that I would approve or advocate for the monitoring of students at home. I suggest you take

1034-411: A member of the district Superintendent's five-person Cabinet) that district Network Technician Mike Perbix "loves it, and I agree it is a great product". Perbix also raved about the spying capabilities of TheftTrack in a May 2008 LANrev promotional webcast , saying he "really, really" liked it. DiMedio considered Perbix and Cafiero's recommendations that the district purchase the software, including

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1128-462: A memo in which Cafiero noted that "we can mark [a student's laptop as] stolen on the LANrev server, and then the laptop will take screenshots and pictures of the user with the built-in camera, and transmit that information back to our server." DiMedio then approved the purchase and installation of the $ 156,000 surveillance software. The school district intentionally did not publicize the existence of

1222-466: A photo taken by a school-issued laptop to discipline a student. The vice principal reiterated the statement in a video distributed to national media on February 24, 2010. On February 20, 2010, Haltzman, Robbins' counsel, told MSNBC Live that Robbins had been sitting in his home eating " Mike and Ike " candy in front of his school-issued laptop. The attorney said that the vice-principal had accused Robbins of taking illegal pills after seeing him eating

1316-445: A preliminary injunction, ordering the school district to stop its secret webcam monitoring, and ordered the district to pay the plaintiffs' attorney fees. The lawsuit was filed after 15-year-old high school sophomore (second year student) Blake Robbins was disciplined at school for his behavior in his bedroom. The school based its decision to discipline Robbins on a photograph that had been secretly taken of him in his bedroom, via

1410-470: A primary source (the researcher is the first person to obtain the data) or a secondary source (the researcher obtains the data that has already been collected by other sources, such as data disseminated in a scientific journal). Data analysis methodologies vary and include data triangulation and data percolation. The latter offers an articulate method of collecting, classifying, and analyzing data using five possible angles of analysis (at least three) to maximize

1504-433: A statement to the press on February 24, 2010, Robbins emphasized that the case was about the undisclosed spying capabilities which the district covertly maintained. The school district later admitted to "serious mistakes" and "misguided actions". It also acknowledged that its monitoring system was flawed, and was "not handled appropriately". The district's Superintendent admitted that students and parents were not informed of

1598-514: A third of which was covered by grants. The school loaded each student's computer with LANrev's remote activation and tracking software. This included the now-discontinued "TheftTrack". While TheftTrack was not enabled by default on the software, the program allowed the school district to elect to activate it, and to enable whichever of TheftTrack's surveillance options the school desired. The school elected to enable TheftTrack to allow school district employees to secretly and remotely activate

1692-478: A third parallel suit that a third student intended to bring against the district, for "improper surveillance of the Lower Merion High School student on his school issued laptop", which included taking over 700 webcam shots and screenshots between December 2009 and February 2010. The lawsuit Robbins v. Lower Merion School District was filed on February 11, 2010, in the U.S. District Court for

1786-408: A widely published photograph, Robbins was shown sleeping in his bed. The hundreds of photos taken of the 15-year-old also included him standing shirtless after getting out of the shower, as well as photos of his father and friends. Not included in what was turned over to the family was one week's worth of images that the school district said it had not been able to recover. The lawsuit claimed that

1880-554: Is a federal class action lawsuit, brought during February 2010 on behalf of students of two high schools in Lower Merion Township , a suburb of Philadelphia . In October 2010, the school district agreed to pay $ 610,000 to settle the Robbins and parallel Hasan lawsuits against it. The suit alleged that, in what was dubbed the " WebcamGate " scandal, the schools secretly spied on the students while they were in

1974-519: Is an individual value in a collection of data. Data are usually organized into structures such as tables that provide additional context and meaning, and may themselves be used as data in larger structures. Data may be used as variables in a computational process . Data may represent abstract ideas or concrete measurements. Data are commonly used in scientific research , economics , and virtually every other form of human organizational activity. Examples of data sets include price indices (such as

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2068-529: Is available. In Robbins v. Lower Merion School District (2010), also known as "WebcamGate", the plaintiffs charged that two suburban Philadelphia high schools violated ECPA by remotely activating the webcams embedded in school-issued laptops and monitoring the students at home. The schools admitted to secretly snapping over 66,000 webshots and screenshots , including webcam shots of students in their bedrooms. ECPA has been criticized for failing to protect all communications and consumer records, mainly because

2162-485: Is needed to gain access to communiqué is for an employer to simply give notice or a supervisor to report that the employee's actions are not in the company's interest. This means that, with minimal assumptions, an employer can monitor communications within the company. The ongoing debate is, where to limit the government's power to see into civilian lives, while balancing the need to curb national threats. In 2011, The New York Times published "1986 Privacy Law Is Outrun by

2256-405: Is the awareness of its environment that some entity possesses, whereas data merely communicates that knowledge. For example, the entry in a database specifying the height of Mount Everest is a datum that communicates a precisely-measured value. This measurement may be included in a book along with other data on Mount Everest to describe the mountain in a manner useful for those who wish to decide on

2350-448: Is the classic definition of spyware. It's as bad as you can imagine." Eileen Lake of Wynnewood , whose three children attend district schools, said: "If there's a concern that laptops are misplaced or stolen, they should install a chip to locate them instead. There shouldn't be a reason to use webcams for that purpose." Marc Rotenberg , Georgetown University Law School information privacy professor and President and executive director of

2444-443: Is the longevity of data. Scientific research generates huge amounts of data, especially in genomics and astronomy , but also in the medical sciences , e.g. in medical imaging . In the past, scientific data has been published in papers and books, stored in libraries, but more recently practically all data is stored on hard drives or optical discs . However, in contrast to paper, these storage devices may become unreadable after

2538-404: Is the plural of datum , "(thing) given," and the neuter past participle of dare , "to give". The first English use of the word "data" is from the 1640s. The word "data" was first used to mean "transmissible and storable computer information" in 1946. The expression "data processing" was first used in 1954. When "data" is used more generally as a synonym for "information", it is treated as

2632-520: The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), said: "There are less intrusive ways to track stolen laptops, no question about it." Commenting on the now-discontinued TheftTrack, Carol Cafiero (school district Information Systems Coordinator, and supervisor of 16 technicians and administrative assistants) wrote to her boss Virginia DiMedio (district Director of Technology for a number of years, until June 2009, and

2726-720: The Fourth Amendment of the Constitution (right to privacy) and a number of electronic communications laws: the U.S. Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA; intentional intercepts of electronic communications), the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA; intentional access of a computer that exceeds authorization to obtain information), the Stored Communications Act (SCA; unauthorized acquisition of stored electronic communications), and

2820-402: The Stored Communications Act ( 18 U.S.C.   § 2701 et seq. ), and added so-called pen/trap provisions that permit the tracing of telephone communications ( 18 U.S.C.   § 3121 et seq. ). 18 U.S.C.   § 3123(d)(2) provides for gag orders which direct the recipient of a pen register or trap and trace device order not to disclose the existence of

2914-526: The consumer price index ), unemployment rates , literacy rates, and census data. In this context, data represent the raw facts and figures from which useful information can be extracted. Data are collected using techniques such as measurement , observation , query , or analysis , and are typically represented as numbers or characters that may be further processed . Field data are data that are collected in an uncontrolled, in-situ environment. Experimental data are data that are generated in

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3008-443: The 20th and 21st centuries. Some style guides do not recognize the different meanings of the term and simply recommend the form that best suits the target audience of the guide. For example, APA style as of the 7th edition requires "data" to be treated as a plural form. Data, information , knowledge , and wisdom are closely related concepts, but each has its role concerning the other, and each term has its meaning. According to

3102-547: The ECPA did not protect e-mail in temporary storage, its added protections were meaningless as virtually all electronic mail is stored temporarily in transit at least once and that Congress would have known this in 1986 when the law was passed. (see, e.g., RFC 822). The case was eventually dismissed on grounds unrelated to ECPA issues. The seizure of a computer, used to operate an electronic bulletin board system , and containing private electronic mail which had been sent to (stored on)

3196-415: The ECPA, the Stored Communications Act (SCA), protects communications held in electronic storage, most notably messages stored on computers. Its protections are weaker than those of Title I, however, and do not impose heightened standards for warrants. Title III prohibits the use of pen register and/or trap and trace devices to record dialing, routing, addressing, and signaling information used in

3290-489: The Eastern District of Pennsylvania , by plaintiffs' lead lawyer, Mark S. Haltzman of Silverang, Donohoe, Rosenzweig & Haltzman LLC. It was filed on behalf of Blake J. Robbins, and other high school students from the school district, by Robbins' parents. The complaint alleged that after the high schools issued MacBook laptops with built-in iSight webcams to the students, school staff remotely activated

3384-575: The Pennsylvania Wiretapping and Electronic Surveillance Act (PWESA; intentional intercept of electronic communications). School district spokesman Doug Young announced on February 19 that the school district intended to contest the lawsuit. Henry E. Hockeimer, Jr., and four Ballard Spahr attorneys represented the district. On February 18, 2010, the day the case was made public, the school district posted an initial reply on its website asserting that: "The tracking-security feature

3478-805: The Web", highlighting that: ...the Justice Department argued in court that cellphone users had given up the expectation of privacy about their location by voluntarily giving that information to carriers. In April, it argued in a federal court in Colorado that it ought to have access to some e-mails without a search warrant. And federal law enforcement officials, citing technology advances, plan to ask for new regulations that would smooth their ability to perform legal wiretaps of various Internet communications. The analysis went on to discuss how Google , Facebook , Verizon , Twitter and other companies are in

3572-439: The act of observation as constitutive, is offered as an alternative to data for visual representations in the humanities. The term data-driven is a neologism applied to an activity which is primarily compelled by data over all other factors. Data-driven applications include data-driven programming and data-driven journalism . Robbins v. Lower Merion School District Robbins v. Lower Merion School District

3666-433: The best method to climb it. Awareness of the characteristics represented by this data is knowledge. Data are often assumed to be the least abstract concept, information the next least, and knowledge the most abstract. In this view, data becomes information by interpretation; e.g., the height of Mount Everest is generally considered "data", a book on Mount Everest geological characteristics may be considered "information", and

3760-434: The binary alphabet. Some special forms of data are distinguished. A computer program is a collection of data, that can be interpreted as instructions. Most computer languages make a distinction between programs and the other data on which programs operate, but in some languages, notably Lisp and similar languages, programs are essentially indistinguishable from other data. It is also useful to distinguish metadata , that is,

3854-513: The bulletin board, but not read (retrieved) by the intended recipients, does not constitute an unlawful intercept under the Federal Wiretap Act, 18 U.S.C. s 2510, et seq., as amended by Title I of ECPA. Governments can actually track cell phones in real time without a search warrant under ECPA by analyzing information as to antennae being contacted by cell phones, as long as the cell phone is used in public where visual surveillance

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3948-430: The camera on his computer, and gave images it covertly took to two Harriton High School principals. Six days after the initiation of the lawsuit, and after a district review of its privacy policies, the school district disabled its ability to activate students' webcams remotely. Lillie Coney of the Electronic Privacy Information Center said: "If they thought it was right, they wouldn't have stopped." On February 24,

4042-467: The camera was not in use, signaling that the webcam had been turned on. Student Katerina Perech recalled: "It was just really creepy." Some school officials reportedly denied that it was anything other than a technical glitch, and offered to have the laptops examined if students were concerned. Kline admitted the school could covertly photograph students using the laptops' cameras. The students told him they were worried about privacy rights, asked whether

4136-415: The candy in a webcam image. Michael Smerconish , a Philadelphia Inquirer columnist who reviewed the photo, said that it did in fact appear to be the same size and shape as Mike and Ike candy. Haltzman said that his client's laptop had not been reported stolen or lost. The lawyer also raised questions as to who in the school system decided when to activate each student's webcam, and for what reasons. In

4230-617: The concept of a sign to differentiate between data and information; data is a series of symbols, while information occurs when the symbols are used to refer to something. Before the development of computing devices and machines, people had to manually collect data and impose patterns on it. With the development of computing devices and machines, these devices can also collect data. In the 2010s, computers were widely used in many fields to collect data and sort or process it, in disciplines ranging from marketing , analysis of social service usage by citizens to scientific research. These patterns in

4324-615: The content of the emails by a law enforcement agency is a written statement certifying that the information is relevant to an investigation, without judicial review . When the law was initially passed, emails were stored on a third party's server for only a short period of time, just long enough to facilitate transfer of email to the consumer's email client, which was generally located on their personal or work computer. Now, with online email services prevalent such as Gmail and Hotmail , users are more likely to store emails online indefinitely, rather than to only keep them for less than 180 days. If

4418-444: The course of a controlled scientific experiment. Data are analyzed using techniques such as calculation , reasoning , discussion, presentation , visualization , or other forms of post-analysis. Prior to analysis, raw data (or unprocessed data) is typically cleaned: Outliers are removed, and obvious instrument or data entry errors are corrected. Data can be seen as the smallest units of factual information that can be used as

4512-408: The data are seen as information that can be used to enhance knowledge. These patterns may be interpreted as " truth " (though "truth" can be a subjective concept) and may be authorized as aesthetic and ethical criteria in some disciplines or cultures. Events that leave behind perceivable physical or virtual remains can be traced back through data. Marks are no longer considered data once the link between

4606-423: The defendants recovered 66,503 images produced by LANrev, though it was not able to recover all that had been deleted by district employees. The district asserted that it did not have any evidence that individual students had been specifically targeted. Haltzman said: "I wish the school district [had] come clean earlier, as soon as they had this information ... not waiting until something was filed in court revealing

4700-410: The district could not disclose that fact. Young asserted that the district never violated its policy of only using the remote-activation software to find missing laptops. That same day, the district turned off TheftTrack on tracked laptops, and deleted pictures from LANrev, as noted on the 16th page of a subsequent forensics review. The district also denied that the school administrator had ever used

4794-534: The district's use of the webcams violated the United States Constitution 's guarantees of privacy of the students and their families and friends at home, as well as Pennsylvania common law (expectation of privacy) and Section 1983 of the U.S. Civil Rights Act (right to privacy). It also accused officials of spying through "indiscriminate use of an ability to remotely activate the webcams incorporated into each laptop", and thereby violating

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4888-575: The ethos of data as "given". Peter Checkland introduced the term capta (from the Latin capere , "to take") to distinguish between an immense number of possible data and a sub-set of them, to which attention is oriented. Johanna Drucker has argued that since the humanities affirm knowledge production as "situated, partial, and constitutive," using data may introduce assumptions that are counterproductive, for example that phenomena are discrete or are observer-independent. The term capta , which emphasizes

4982-481: The extent of the spying". Christopher Null , technology writer for Yahoo! News , observed: "It's a little difficult to believe that none of the material captured is scandalous". The district also admitted that in Robbins' case the remote surveillance was activated and left running for two weeks, even though school officials knew the laptop was at Robbins' home. It also admitted that its technology staff activated

5076-410: The image to the school's server, the laptop was programmed to erase the "sent" file created on the laptop. That way, there would not be any trace by which students might realize that they were being watched and photographed. The forwarded photos, screenshots, and IP addresses were stored on the school's server, until they were purged by a school employee. It is not clear who in the schools had access to

5170-428: The images captured from Robbins' webcam and screenshots with Harriton High School Principal Kline and with Matsko. In early November, a number of Harriton High School administrators, including Kline, Matsko, and Assistant Principal Lauren Marcuson, met to discuss the images. According to Matsko, Kline advised her that unless there was additional evidence giving them a contextual basis for doing so, they should not discuss

5264-421: The images with Robbins or his parents, because they involved off-school-campus activities. However, Matsko ultimately decided to discuss certain images with Robbins or his parents. Matsko called Robbins into her office on November 11, 2009. She showed him a photograph taken with the webcam embedded in his school-issued laptop, as he was in his bedroom in his Penn Valley home. Matsko indicated that she thought it

5358-498: The issues raised by the schools' secret surveillance, and Senator Arlen Specter introduced draft legislation in the Senate to protect against it in the future. Parents, media, and academics criticized the schools, and the matter was cited as a cautionary example of how modern technology can be used to infringe on personal privacy. In July 2010, another student, Jalil Hasan, filed a parallel second suit. It related to 1,000+ images that

5452-403: The laptop's Internet (IP) address , enabling district technicians to discover which city the laptop was located in and its Internet service provider , though a subpoena to the provider would be required to pinpoint the exact location. In addition, LANrev allowed school officials to take snapshots of instant messages , web browsing , music playlists, and written compositions. After sending

5546-437: The laptop, and O'Brien responded "yes". Over the next 15 days, the school district captured at least 210 webcam photos and 218 screenshots. They included photos inside his home of Robbins sleeping and of him partially undressed, as well as photos of his father. The district also snapped images of Robbins' instant messages and video chats with his friends, and sent them to its servers. Those 429 images, however, only reflected

5640-574: The laptops' webcams covertly while the students were off school property, thereby invading the students' privacy. The plaintiffs said they had not consented to the spying. The defendants were the Lower Merion School District (LMSD) in Pennsylvania (of which the two high schools are part), its nine-member Board of Directors, and its Superintendent (Christopher McGinley). Henry E. Hockeimer, Jr., of Ballard Spahr LLP

5734-406: The law is so outdated and out of touch with how people currently share, store, and use information. Under ECPA, it is relatively easy for a government agency to demand service providers hand over personal consumer data stored on the service provider's servers. Email that is stored on a third party's server for more than 180 days is considered by the law to be abandoned. All that is required to obtain

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5828-472: The list of crimes that can justify the use of surveillance, as well as the number of judicial members who can authorize such surveillance. Data can be obtained on traffic and calling patterns of an individual or a group without a warrant, allowing an agency to gain valuable intelligence and possibly invade privacy without any scrutiny, because the actual content of the communication is left untouched. While workplace communications are, in theory, protected, all that

5922-538: The mark and observation is broken. Mechanical computing devices are classified according to how they represent data. An analog computer represents a datum as a voltage, distance, position, or other physical quantity. A digital computer represents a piece of data as a sequence of symbols drawn from a fixed alphabet . The most common digital computers use a binary alphabet, that is, an alphabet of two characters typically denoted "0" and "1". More familiar representations, such as numbers or letters, are then constructed from

6016-404: The middle between users and governments. Data In common usage , data ( / ˈ d eɪ t ə / , also US : / ˈ d æ t ə / ) is a collection of discrete or continuous values that convey information , describing the quantity , quality , fact , statistics , other basic units of meaning, or simply sequences of symbols that may be further interpreted formally . A datum

6110-526: The network it is connected to, and occasional screen/camera shots of the computer being operated. ... The tracking feature does NOT do things like record web browsing, chatting, email, or any other type of " spyware " features that you might be thinking of. Being a student intern with us means that you are privy to some things that others rarely get to see, and some things that might even work against us. I assure you that we in no way, shape, or form employ any Big Brother tactics, ESPECIALLY with computers off

6204-526: The network. In addition, two members of the Harriton High School student council twice privately confronted their Principal, Steven Kline, more than a year prior to the suit. They were concerned "that the school could covertly photograph students using the laptops' cameras". Students were particularly troubled by the momentary flickering of their webcams' green activation lights, which several students reported would periodically turn on when

6298-406: The number of images later recovered—during the ensuing litigation the district conceded it had been unable to recover a week's worth of images that it had taken. On October 26, Perbix observed one of the screenshots of Robbins, taken in his bedroom. Four days later Perbix showed it to his boss, district Director of Information Systems George Frazier. After discussing it with Frazier, Perbix shared

6392-481: The pen/trap or the investigation. The ECPA extended privacy protections provided by the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 (of employers monitoring of employees phone calls) to include also electronic and cell phone communications. See also Employee monitoring and Workplace privacy . Several court cases have raised the question of whether e-mail messages are protected under

6486-522: The petabyte scale. Using traditional data analysis methods and computing, working with such large (and growing) datasets is difficult, even impossible. (Theoretically speaking, infinite data would yield infinite information, which would render extracting insights or intelligence impossible.) In response, the relatively new field of data science uses machine learning (and other artificial intelligence (AI)) methods that allow for efficient applications of analytic methods to big data. The Latin word data

6580-465: The photos and other images. Further, LANrev could be programmed to capture webcam pictures and screen captures automatically, and store them on the laptop's hard disk for later retrieval in areas of the computer's storage that were not accessible by the student, and which could be deleted remotely. Fred Cate, Director of the Center for Applied Cybersecurity Research at Indiana University , said: "This

6674-439: The privacy of their homes. School authorities surreptitiously and remotely activated webcams embedded in school-issued laptops the students were using at home. After the suit was brought, the school district, of which the two high schools are part, revealed that it had secretly taken more than 66,000 images. The suit charged that in doing so the district infringed on its students' privacy rights . A federal judge issued

6768-405: The problem of reproducibility is the attempt to require FAIR data , that is, data that is Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable. Data that fulfills these requirements can be used in subsequent research and thus advances science and technology. Although data is also increasingly used in other fields, it has been suggested that the highly interpretive nature of them might be at odds with

6862-747: The process of transmitting wire or electronic communications without a court order. The law was first brought to attention after the Captain Midnight broadcast signal intrusion , where electrical engineer John R. MacDougall hacked into the HBO signal on April 27, 1986. As a consequence, this act was passed. This act also made satellite hijacking a felony. The ECPA extended government restrictions on wire taps from telephone calls to include transmissions of electronic data by computer ( 18 U.S.C.   § 2510 et seq. ), added new provisions prohibiting access to stored electronic communications, i.e.,

6956-452: The requested data. Overall, the likelihood of retrieving data dropped by 17% each year after publication. Similarly, a survey of 100 datasets in Dryad found that more than half lacked the details to reproduce the research results from these studies. This shows the dire situation of access to scientific data that is not published or does not have enough details to be reproduced. A solution to

7050-457: The research's objectivity and permit an understanding of the phenomena under investigation as complete as possible: qualitative and quantitative methods, literature reviews (including scholarly articles), interviews with experts, and computer simulation. The data is thereafter "percolated" using a series of pre-determined steps so as to extract the most relevant information. An important field in computer science , technology , and library science

7144-402: The same emails were stored on the user's personal computer, it would require the police to obtain a warrant first for seizure of their contents, regardless of their age. When they are stored on an internet server however, no warrant is needed, starting 180 days after receipt of the message, under the law. In 2013, members of the U.S. Congress proposed to reform this procedure. ECPA also increased

7238-441: The school had photographed Robbins in his bed. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), U.S. Attorney's Office, and Montgomery County District Attorney all initiated criminal investigations of the matter, which they combined and then closed because they did not find evidence "that would establish beyond a reasonable doubt that anyone involved had criminal intent". In addition, a U.S. Senate Judiciary subcommittee held hearings on

7332-674: The school system read the saved files on their computers, and suggested that at minimum the student body should be warned formally of possible surveillance. No such action was taken. On October 20, 2009, school district officials knew Blake J. Robbins, a sophomore at Harriton High School, was in possession of his laptop and had taken it home. On that day, they nevertheless decided to begin capturing webcam photos and screenshots from his school-issued MacBook, by activating its camera covertly. Building-Level Technician Kyle O'Brien testified later, at his deposition, that Harriton High School Assistant Vice Principal Lindy Matsko directed O'Brien to activate

7426-468: The school took surreptitiously via his computer over a two-month period, including shots of him in his bedroom. The district had deactivated its surveillance of the student in February 2010, after the Robbins lawsuit was filed. Five months later—pursuant to a court order in the Robbins case—it informed Hasan for the first time that it had secretly taken the photographs. The district was put on notice of

7520-416: The school's IT Department sent an email to DiMedio, with the subject line: "1:1 concern (Important)". He said that he had recently learned of the district's purchase of LANrev, and had researched the software. He had made the "somewhat startling" discovery that it would allow school employees to monitor students' laptops remotely. He wrote: I would not find this a problem if students were informed that this

7614-450: The secret spying feature, and the district said that "notice should have been given" to the students and parents, and that the district's failure to do so "was a significant mistake". School Board President David Ebby said: "It's a big, big horrible error in judgment." The school district eventually acknowledged that it had taken more than half the images after missing laptops were recovered. A computer forensics study commissioned by

7708-404: The standard webcam featured in all Apple laptops since 2006. That allowed school officials to secretly take photographs through the webcam, of whatever was in front of it and in its line of sight, and send the photographs to the school's server. The system took and sent a new photograph every 15 minutes when the laptop was on, and TheftTrack was activated, though school employees could adjust

7802-475: The stricter provisions of Title I while they were in transient storage en route to their final destination. In United States v. Councilman , a U.S. district court and a three-judge appeals panel ruled they were not, but in 2005, the full United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit reversed this opinion. Privacy advocates were relieved; they had argued in amicus curiae briefs that if

7896-403: The surveillance technology. It also actively sought to conceal it. The district did not inform students or their parents, in any of its communications with them (including the district's promotion of the laptop program, guidelines about the laptops, and the individual contracts that it gave students to sign), that the laptops gave the district the ability to secretly take photographs of whatever

7990-474: The synthesis of data into information, can then be described as knowledge . Data has been described as "the new oil of the digital economy ". Data, as a general concept , refers to the fact that some existing information or knowledge is represented or coded in some form suitable for better usage or processing . Advances in computing technologies have led to the advent of big data , which usually refers to very large quantities of data, usually at

8084-401: The timeframe to as low as one-minute intervals. LANrev disabled the webcams for all other uses (e.g., students were unable to use Photo Booth or video chat ), so most students mistakenly believed that their webcams did not work at all. In addition, TheftTrack allowed school officials to take screenshots , and send them to the school's server. Furthermore, a locating device would record

8178-539: The tracking. O'Brien complied, by e-mailing District Network Technician Perbix, and directing him to initiate the TheftTrack. At her deposition, Matsko denied authorizing the tracking. Two hours later on October 20, Perbix e-mailed O'Brien to let him know that TheftTrack was running on Robbins' computer, and that Perbix had determined Robbins' location. Perbix wrote: "Now currently online at home." The next day, Perbix asked O'Brien whether he should continue tracking

8272-420: The webcam in his school-issued laptop. Without telling its students, the schools remotely accessed their school-issued laptops to secretly take pictures of students in their own homes, their chat logs, and records of the websites they visited. The school then transmitted the images to servers at the school, where school authorities reviewed them and shared the snapshots with others. In one widely published photo,

8366-402: Was "proof", and initially disciplined him for "improper behavior" (drug use and sales). His parents were contacted, and they told school officials that the officials were mistaken. Ultimately, Robbins was not disciplined. Robbins said that Matsko told him that the district was able to activate the webcam embedded in a student's laptop remotely at any time, and view and copy whatever image

8460-607: Was in the line of sight of the student-issued laptop webcams, and to take screenshots; nor did it inform them that the district would avail itself of those capabilities. The district also did not adopt policies regarding the use of TheftTrack by district employees. DiMedio said "the district did not widely publicize the feature 'for obvious reasons ' ". She reportedly declined to tell students about TheftTrack because doing so could "defeat its purpose". Perbix said that when "you're controlling someone's machine, you don't want them to know what you're doing". He praised TheftTrack in

8554-542: Was lead counsel for the defendants. At the beginning of the 2009–10 school year, the school district issued individual Apple MacBook laptop computers to each of its 2,306 high school students. The laptops were for both in-school and at-home use. It was part of the school district's One-to-One initiative. The program was piloted in September 2008 at Harriton High School and expanded in September 2009 to Lower Merion High School . It cost $ 2.6 million, less than

8648-468: Was limited to taking a still image of the operator and the operator's screen", and that it "has only been used for the limited purpose of locating a lost, stolen, or missing laptop." On 19 February the district said in a further statement to parents that "this includes tracking down a loaner computer that, against regulations, might be taken off campus." The complaint had not indicated whether Robbins' laptop had been reported lost or stolen, and Young said

8742-614: Was possible, for privacy's sake. However, what was appalling was that not only did the District not inform parents and students of this fact ... [W]hile you may feel that you can say that this access will not be abused, I feel that this is not enough to ensure the integrity of students, and that even if it was no one would have any way of knowing (especially end-users). I feel it would be best that students and parents are informed of this before they receive their computers. ... I could see not informing parents and students of this fact causing

8836-487: Was visible—without the knowledge or consent of anyone in the webcam's line of sight. After a district counselor told them that an account of the incident had been placed in Robbins' personal school file, however, the family decided to bring suit. The plaintiffs alleged that: many of the images captured and intercepted may consist of images of minors and their parents or friends in compromising or embarrassing positions, including ... various stages of dress or undress. In

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