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

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

#191

Post by jrockway » Tue, Apr 05, 2022, 12:56 AM UTC

spamizbad wrote: post #183

quadrifoliate wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few minutes of Googling showed me this upcoming meeting https://www.cpsboe.org/meetings/details/2329 on April 27th, 2022. It seems to be a Chicago Board of Education meeting, and seems to have options for public participation. Do I have this wrong? I'm not from Chicago or Illinois, so that's quite possible.

You can indeed attend and raise concerns but it will likely be ignored. Nobody is worried about losing their seat if they ignore constituent complaints.

Yeah, I don't really know how the Chicago school board meetings go, but I watch the MTA board meetings. (The MTA is New York State's public transportation agency.) They have a public comment section where you get 2 minutes to say whatever you want. These rants are usually completely incoherent and I doubt any board member could remember a specific point from any one of the commenters. I watch them all and I certainly can't. The law requires that you be allowed to speak. The law does not require the board to take any action on your comments, or even remember a single point you tried to make. ("I've said it before and I'll say it again. Democracy simply doesn't work.")

That said, my advice here would be to keep it short and non-emotional. You can speak for two minutes, but you don't have to use all two minutes. Say what's wrong, what action you want the board to take, and how interested board members can get ahold of you.

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

#192

Post by PragmaticPulp » Tue, Apr 05, 2022, 12:57 AM UTC

n8cpdx wrote: post #134

quadrifoliate wrote: post #116

> 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…

> Call into the school's board meeting during public comment, and make it loud and clear that the school is installing spyware on students' Chromebooks. Share your technical credentials and the method by which you found this. Just some comments on the political aspect of this, since the HN crowd tends to not be so good at that part: - Following this advice and using a tone that even resembles the tone of the comment…

> Following this advice and using a tone that even resembles the tone of the comment or the original post will make you look/sound crazy.

Thank you. Also, please ignore every comment in this thread suggesting you lawyer up or go to small claims court. The laptop isn't ruined and can be reset whenever the OP wants (as they already established).

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.

If you actually want to get anywhere with this, start with a friendly e-mail to the school's IT staff. Ask them how your child can do their schoolwork without putting the laptop under school control. If you go in with a reasonable approach, you might get a sympathetic IT person who will walk you through the situation and explain the options.

> Realistically what probably happened here is they have slightly clueless people who installed standard-issue software without thinking to check if the student actually owned the chromebook

That would be my first assumption. I would even guess that they aren't keen on having yet another license tied up on a student's device somewhere.

Don't immediately rush to assumptions of malicious intent, don't think that making a scene at a school board event will further your goals, and definitely don't take any of the suggestions here to lawyer up or otherwise waste a lot of time and money on a legal fight that you will surely lose.

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

#193

Post by ac29 » Tue, Apr 05, 2022, 1:01 AM UTC

MereInterest wrote: post #177

ghostpepper wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does a chromebook allow you to have more than one user account? It sounds like a factory reset was necessary to allow enrollment

Chromebooks do allow more than one user account, yes. The factory reset mentioned by the OP was necessary in order to undo the enrollment, as no application of Administrator/Owner privileges would undo it otherwise.

I think you misunderstand the original post - the parent didnt have some sort of local administrator account (which isnt really a thing on ChromeOS). They signed into a managed account run by the school district, didnt like the policy, then reset the device, signed into the same managed account again, and noticed the same policy was applied.

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

#194

Post by selectodude » Tue, Apr 05, 2022, 1:01 AM UTC

ananonymoususer wrote: post #71

wanderer_ wrote: post #27

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 brows…

Good suggestion. If the school is requiring your child to have the chromebook, then they should pay for the thing. They don't have the right to infect any device that your child happens to log in with. So factory reset, don't log in. Then when the school complains that the child is not completing the assignments, tell them that he/she cannot do them unless the school issues a school-owned device. A better move would…

CPS does pay for the thing. OP wanted their child to use a fancier device and they're mad that it falls under CPS' MDM policy. Go get a free device from CPS, take good care of it, and return it once the child graduates.

https://www.cps.edu/school-reopening/remote-learning/technol...

>A better move would be to get your child out of Chicago public schools altogether.

I went to a Chicago Public School and I resent that comment greatly.

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

#195

Post by willcipriano » Tue, Apr 05, 2022, 1:01 AM UTC

anamax wrote: post #18

If it's not too late, return it to where you got it. Then tell the school district that they have to pay for computers that they control. > Does anyone know how to refer these people to law enforcement for prosecution? You call the police. However, don't expect them to do anything and you won't be disappointed when they don't. You can then call the city/county DA and get the same treatment. The state's attorney will…

> Then tell the school district that they have to pay for computers that they control.

100% on board with this. I would refuse to pay for a machine that is going to spy on my kid.

I'd probably buy a chrome book, install Linux and then they can access the google suite via a browser.

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

#196

Post by Dylan16807 » Tue, Apr 05, 2022, 1:02 AM UTC

op00to wrote: post #148

awinter-py wrote: post #20

related support ticket from someone trying to log into device w/ work account without inheriting workplace MDM policy https://support.google.com/chromebook/thread/117916330/how-t... > Even if the Chromebook is your private device and your owner account is your private @gmail.com account, once you sign in with a managed account, even using a separate profile, the managed account polices become active. > This is NOT a…

Suing the CPS over this is simply taking money out of everyone else's pocket for your own enrichment.

It's to make them stop doing it, not to profit.

Right now they're spending money to spy on students, so fighting that is worth it.

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

#197

Post by fiddlerwoaroof » Tue, Apr 05, 2022, 1:02 AM UTC

evilDagmar wrote: post #173

quadrifoliate wrote: post #116

> 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…

> Chromebooks are designed from the ground up to be locked-down dystopian spyware once you "log in" to them with a specific Google account. Nonsense. They were designed to implement required policies when someone logs into a managed domain. Unless you're logging into something like that (where disclosures have been made and consent has been obtained) then there's no "dystopian spyware" involved. Absent any domain man…

One solution could be to setup the laptop with a personal email account and configure the school email address to forward everything.

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

#198

Post by zulban » Tue, Apr 05, 2022, 1:05 AM UTC

n8cpdx wrote: post #134

quadrifoliate wrote: post #116

> 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…

> Call into the school's board meeting during public comment, and make it loud and clear that the school is installing spyware on students' Chromebooks. Share your technical credentials and the method by which you found this. Just some comments on the political aspect of this, since the HN crowd tends to not be so good at that part: - Following this advice and using a tone that even resembles the tone of the comment…

Brilliantly written feedback, I hope folks take it to heart.

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

#199

Post by harikb » Tue, Apr 05, 2022, 1:06 AM UTC

Our school (Bay Area/South Bay) uses GoGardian as well. The middle school also forces MITM-ed certificates via securely to monitor all traffic to anyone who wants school WiFi (student, volunteer, or staff)

But I am not panicking though. The companies we work for make such software (list any “enterprise” security company here).

You might own the machine, but they will force the machine to be “managed” if you want to access their network.

Btw GoGaurdian also gets installed if you access the school “Google Suite” account from even your own PC or Mac, not limited to Chromebooks.

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

#200

Post by twright0 » Tue, Apr 05, 2022, 1:07 AM UTC

throwawayboise wrote: post #15

dervjd wrote: post #10

Why did you buy him the Chromebook versus the district?

Yes. The district should supply the Chromebook for school work. They will manage that as they see fit. If he wants to do other stuff with a Chromebook, he should have a separate Chromebook and separate Google account. Ultimately that's easier and safer than constantly logging in and out of two different accounts on one machine anyway.

> The district should supply the Chromebook for school work. They will manage that as they see fit.

I haven't been a student for a while, but the closest analogous technology they had when I was in high school was my graphing calculator for math classes. The school district mandated individual students each obtain a specific graphing calculator, which was a fully programmable computing environment (the TI-83). But the teachers/administration could and would wield a lot of power over those devices (which the the families owned in the legal sense) - looking through it, requiring students to wipe its storage with no warning, etc. Requiring families to buy a Chromebook and still use a school-managed account with invasive management on it feels largely analogous.

Buying a separate personal laptop is the correct workaround, but unfortunately I don't think the "the school should supply the schoolwork computer" line of reasoning holds up. The hardware/software has become more powerful in the graduation from TI-83 to Chromebook but the principles are the same.