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Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it

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Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it

#21

Post by secabeen »

throwaway413 wrote: post #9

Nothing gets “installed” in the traditional sense on a chromebook. When you login to the chromebook, you can log in with any Google credentials. The credentials the school gave your son are managed by them. If you log into that account, it configured the user session per the management of the account, so this will start a “managed” session for that managed user. If you use a personal Google account, none of that shou…

This. My kids have chromebooks, and they have two accounts active on their devices, on at their .k12 for school stuff, and one for their gmail that is open.

Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it

#22

Post by yeetsfromhellL2 »

As a longtime armchair attorney who has closely read summaries of cases like this on Slashdot for well over the past decade (IANAL, BTW)...you could go the lawyer route but this basically amounts to your kid being a minor in school which means they don't have full legal rights, and the interpretation of 4A is likely up in the air here anyway. Constitutional rights don't necessarily apply at school or anywhere near school (see bongrips4jesus case), your kid is a minor anyway (another special case), and a school doing this for the sake of "preventing cheating" may not fall under the umbrella of unreasonable search.

There was a PA school district back around 2009 that issued laptops to students preloaded with spyware that let school staff watch students through the webcam, while the students were at home and not doing schoolwork. Neither the students or parents were informed of this. IIRC the FBI got involved but nobody actually got in any real trouble, I'm not even sure they were fired.

I wish things weren't this way. You could maybe use Wireshark and black hole anything the spyware tries to connect to at the router, or maybe add the addresses to the hosts file on the machine itself (not sure if ChromeOS lets you do this).

Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it

#23

Post by tragictrash »

turtlebits wrote: post #14

Powerwash/factory reset it and don’t sign into the school account. Ask for the school to provide a device.

I think it's now a managed device and that won't help.

If he power washes it, I believe it's still locked down to the school, I could be wrong thought.

Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it

#25

Post by vinceguidry »

summm wrote: post #16

Why did you buy a device that's patronizing you in the first place? You bought a device that is even advertised as not being fully under your control, then it turns out it's actually not under your control. Meh. Put Linux on it and next time buy an normal PC.

You are completely failing to grasp the level of tyranny here. Schools these days often will not accept non-Chromebook devices.

Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it

#27

Post by wanderer_ »

I would do the factory reset again and then not use that account anymore. If you want, you can create a new local-only account and then (this is the important part) sign in to the school Google Classroom on another browser. Install Firefox, Brave, something, and use it for the school account rather than Chrome. Chrome allows extensions installed to it to run in the background and manage the system, but another browser cannot.

Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it

#28

Post by dragonwriter »

> Does anyone know how to refer these people to law enforcement for prosecution?

You can simply look up the phone number for any law enforcement agency you want and call them. None of them are likely to do anything, however; even if there was a crime involved, they have no obligation to pursue anything, and it's almost certainly not something that is on anyone 8nnlaw enforcement’s list of priorities.

What you probably want to do is contact a lawyer and see if you have any civil law remedies.

Even if they are things you will eventually pursue in small claims court, you absolutely can get advice from a lawyer on causes of action and what you need to do, but in general forcing a behavioral change—equitable remedies—are not available in small claims (which mostly just allows limited monetary recovery) and you'd need a lawsuit in a “full“ trial court to force that (or, of course, a settlement agreement.)

Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it

#30

Post by fn-mote »

tragictrash wrote: post #23
turtlebits wrote: post #14

Powerwash/factory reset it and don’t sign into the school account. Ask for the school to provide a device.

I think it's now a managed device and that won't help. If he power washes it, I believe it's still locked down to the school, I could be wrong thought.

There's a separate provisioning process for the "very locked" state you're talking about, not just signing in on the device.
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