Install Linux and never look back.
For those interested: GalliumOS.
Apparently you can also install Ubuntu and even NixOS.
Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it
351–360 of 442 posts
Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it
#352Organize other pissed-off parents and persist at school board meetings until they change the policy. You’ll likely be labeled as terrorists for seeking redress with your public officials but stand strong, read up on laws and the board’s bylaws. Let them enter a trap (like ignoring you) where the law/bylaws say you can petition for removal of board member(s) on that cause. You’ll likely have to take it to court. But p…
Considering the range of protections a school is required to provide and that school IT is usually poorly staffed, paid, funded awkwardly… tons of different motivations for various policies. I wouldn’t expect these policies to change. Best bet is to not mix school administrated accounts with personal devices.
> Best bet is to not mix school administrated accounts with personal devices.
I feel like this is the obvious solution which is not fair or practicable to everyone, and so this whole post is about solutions that don't involve ceding an entire device to spyware distributors.
Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it
#353Earlier quoted context omitted.
> create a new local-only account I thought you couldn't do that on a Chromebook.
i don't think you can. I had one of these chromebooks too, which I paid for. But my school did not want to remove the 'school policy' so now it's locked and even other accounts are 'watched' and managed by the school's policy. Last time I tried to create an account it wouldn't let you create it unless you provided an email.
Ah. This makes sense. In this case, I think a throwaway or a personal account will perform the same function, as long as it is not affiliated with the school system.
Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it
#354Even if you send your kid to school with a paper notebook, the staff has always had the legal power to seize and read it. If anything, the school shootings era has expanded that authority even beyond the broad latitude it was granted before: https://www.ascd.org/el/articles/the-right-to-search-student... (Before replying, please note that I'm not expressing any opinion about whether this is good or bad; it's just how…
That authority has always stopped at the sidewalk, too. Taking computers home has altered the scope of potential overreach, particularly with personal computer use at home and the potential school control of camera and microphone devices.
Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it
#355I find this stuff so disheartening. It's like, "how early can we indoctrinate kids into being comfortable being watched and having their every move tracked?" I don't even care what the justifications are. Preventing cheating? Before everyone had personal computers and the internet, people could just copy each others' work. This kind of crap is fundamentally a violation of students' right to privacy. They deserve to g…
The problem is that schools and teachers are at risk from more liability than ever. If a student is groomed online whilst using a school device of login, who do you think is going to get blamed; not the parents but the school. If a child is bullied online or radicalised, then again is will fall back on the school.
You can't have privacy and expect a school to be responsible for what a child does online. Privacy doesn't create a safe environment; and when it comes to crappy adults, out of any group of people parents are the by far the most likely to abuse or neglect children. This idea of "stranger danger" is a myth, as the real danger in most cases is closer to home.
Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it
#356>Does anyone know how to refer these people to law enforcement for prosecution?
Your best bet is probably to contact the office of the Illinois State Attorney General.
Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it
#357Have you tried to see if the Small Claims Court would work? https://ag.state.il.us/consumers/smlclaims.html Get the cost of the Chromebook, some money for your time, and then donate the Chromebook to the school since its deadweight at this point. My guess is that no one from Dept. of ed will show up and you'll get a summary judgment.
Looks like you read it the way I did originally -- that even a factory reset still leaves the GoGuardian software on the machine.
From the gist of comments of people more familiar with chromebooks than me, it actually looks like the factory reset does completely wipe the machine (as you'd expect from "factory reset") and there's no software installed that survives this process (other than the default chromebook stuff)
Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it
#358Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If you go in guns blazing to the school board, the school is going to go into full defensive mode. Once you've established yourself as the aggressive parent with an axe to grind, they're not going to be interested at all in working with you. Too bad! They can be voted out, or face lawsuits if a heated attitude is too much for them that they feel the need to ignore valid feedback regardless of the emotions involved.…
The question I like to ask myself in instances like these, when I'm pissed off at what I see as unreasonable attitudes and processes, is this: Do I care more about making myself feel better by airing my grievances in whatever way suits my fancy, or do I care about a specific outcome? If it's the latter, then the best thing to do is to figure out who is in charge, and, critically, the right way to talk to them in orde…
This! The most important thing I'm asking myself: What do I want to achieve? Does "yelling" at people rises my chances in achieving this? Later on, when my immediate goal is achieved, I can decide do I care enough to follow up or not. First things first - sort out your priority.
Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it
#359Earlier quoted context omitted.
Didn't know they existed. Just called them. They said "no, it cannot be removed". They suggested signing in with a different account, but when I do that, I get the error message "This account is not allowed to sign in within this network."
From your description it sounds like when your child signed in with the student account, one of the Ok's they hit for GoGuardian put your device on the schools managed account(cps.edu). If you're powerwashing and it's automatically pulling cps.edu managed policies as soon as it gets online then the school district IT needs to release your device, and then powerwash it and setup again without the cps.edu policies. Be…
Sorry, are you saying it's impossible to completely wipe/factory-reset a chromebook that's been adopted by an MDM?
Re: Tell HN: My kid's school installed spyware and I can't remove it
#360> I bought him a Chromebook for schoolwork, but also for other private things. When we logged in... This is why you need to pay attention to the technology choices that you make, and that your schools make. Chromebooks are designed from the ground up to be locked-down dystopian spyware once you "log in" to them with a specific Google account. For heaven's sake stop buying any more Chromebooks. The correct solution he…
You’re deeply overestimating how much schools and administrators understand stuff. They are paying for this spyware and want it installed because they think it’s necessary.