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Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

wired.co.uk

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Re: Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

#261

Post by worldsayshi »

cerved wrote: post #247
rootusrootus wrote: post #101

Perhaps Jeff Bezos wasn't the first person to think of it, but I give him credit for the decision to turn every single internal Amazon service into an API. Obviously it worked splendidly for monetizing it, but as a guideline I really appreciate the idea. The better the APIs a project has, the better the quality of interaction with other development. In the end this just raises the tide for everyone.

Program to interfaces not implementations

Hmm, I'm not quite following. Curious how this comment tie in with the one above?

Re: Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

#262

Post by aliswe »

munk-a wrote: post #236
tsimionescu wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One outcome of this fight might be that government organizations are directed to use more proprietary communication methods which would be a poor outcome for everyone involved. I agree with the rest of your argument, but I think that this part is not necessarily a good example of the risks. Far easier would be to use a shared key between the app and the site, and thus use encryption to prevent reading the data, whi…

I think it depends on the outcome of the case - I could see some possible resolution like the Swedish supreme court declaring that JSON counts as a public record and that forcing a block on prohibitive encryption of JSON endpoints offered by the government (assuming everything the OP said about constitutionality is correct). We've seen such bizarre technical decisions from high courts before.

I dont think the swedish legal system uses precedents though. Does that matter?

Re: Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

#263

Post by jazzyjackson »

aneutron wrote: post #162
coldcode wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A long time ago some teammates (prior to my joining the company) had been assigned to work on some VA related health system, turned out they were 8 levels sub contractors, i.e. sub-sub-sub-sub-sub-sub-sub-sub-contractors. Project never shipped.

It still boggles my mind how ANYONE would sign off on a setup like this. How does no one see that this will fail without a single doubt.

because no one has a view of the whole system.

Re: Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

#264

Post by Larrikin »

teawrecks wrote: post #219
wonderwonder wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your parents already had access to the app, just in the form of a folder you were sent home with that had everything printed out. This is just a digitized version, its not the 2nd coming of the Gestapo. Also you need to think about this from the perspective of the parents, having kids in school mean you have to do things, you can either be informed ahead of time and do them in a leisurely manner or you can find out l…

It sounds like you may have had a very unorthodox childhood and may not realize it. No, my parents didn't have access to, or knowledge about my things. As soon as you entrust a child with a document, it is up to that child whether that document survives more than a few steps out of the classroom, let alone whether a parent ever knows about it. That is a very strong form of autonomy, important to a child's development…

When you let elementary school children fail constantly at easy tasks because they forgot about them it just instills in them that the grades don't really matter.

Little children need the habit formation brought on by asking if their homework is done everyday, how they're doing in school, and if there are any upcoming projects because they just don't have the discipline at that age usually. As they get older these checks can lessen if they've formed the correct habits. It also emphasizes that their education is important to you so that they realize it probably should be important to them.

Some children form it earlier than others but you're setting your future kid up for failure and being behind early if you think you should be totally hands off with their education.

Also all the other good parents will be ensuring their kids succeed and children start getting sorted out by grades fairly early in their education. Letting them take a bunch of preventable failures early on before they even realize the importance of education, when you do just seems cruel.

Re: Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

#265

Post by Fiahil »

bjourne wrote: post #132
urvader wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(I am Christian Landgren, cofounder of the project) You are right, the city believes they have ownership of the data, mainly because they fail to understand that they aren’t showing data in an app, but rather publishing data in an API. In Swedish law, once you have released data from a government, the receiver have the right to do whatever they want with the that data (as long as it isn’t violating any other laws). T…

But there is no API here. The article makes it clear that you were intercepting client-server communication not meant to be used by third parties in order to write your own client. That it could be used as an API doesn't matter since the intent wasn't to create an API. I could do the same thing and write an app for, say, the tax agency by scraping its website but it would be a legal gray area.

A website is an API (poorly designed).

The only way to not make an API out of publicly available data, is to encrypt it. Then nobody can read it unless they have the right keys.

Re: Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

#266

Post by munk-a »

aliswe wrote: post #262
munk-a wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it depends on the outcome of the case - I could see some possible resolution like the Swedish supreme court declaring that JSON counts as a public record and that forcing a block on prohibitive encryption of JSON endpoints offered by the government (assuming everything the OP said about constitutionality is correct). We've seen such bizarre technical decisions from high courts before.

I dont think the swedish legal system uses precedents though. Does that matter?

I don't know - I think all legal systems use precedents to a certain extent - they're just extremely formalized in America and Britain. Sorry but I'm not familiar enough with their system to reply with confidence but I would say that if a high court in a country rules a certain way, even if that isn't binding to future rulings, it will cause people to adjust their behavior to avoid falling into a trap that's been clearly called out already.

Uh, also, IANAL.

Re: Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

#267

Post by floren »

GhettoComputers wrote: post #252
henrikschroder wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only reason they're defending their shit is prestige at this point. The system was originally procured by city administrators who had way too little understanding and experience dealing with IT projects. The contract was awarded to one of the big consultant behemoths who specialize in winning government contracts and executing them shoddily. Parents hate it, because it is shit. Anyone in the industry with a brain…

How can there be defense against this? The US does this but the military contracts aren't executed shoddily, although it seems that many others are. Why would they make such a crappy program, don't they have any incentive to have a good reputation or to get more contracts? If it sucks and their history sucks, why would anyone want to hire them?

> The US does this but the military contracts aren't executed shoddily

Did we finally decide to stop shoveling money into the F-35 or is that still ongoing?

Re: Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

#268

Post by urvader »

bjourne wrote: post #184
theptip wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there any way to write an app that doesn’t “publish the data” by this definition? It seems like publishing was not their intent, and furthermore they were not legally allowed to “publish” personal data. For example if their system includes an app that lets you see your students grades and disciplinary issues, presumably you would not want that published. Is it simply impossible to build an app with such data in Sw…

There may be some terminology confusion at play. The data may be an "offentlig handling" ("public document"). Christian's argument is that since the data is a "public document" it can be published through his app. That argument is correct at least as long as he has an "utgivningsbevis" ("letter of publishing rights"?). However, it doesn't follow that the way his app is accessing the data is lawful. You may go to a ba…

No, the app has no communication to us, we don’t even have a server. This means that from a legal standpoint we aren’t publishing any information. We only help our users to present their own data in a better format (than json).

Re: Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

#269

Post by renewiltord »

watwut wrote: post #244
renewiltord wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How did you know the homework wasn’t done?

When homework is not done, teacher sends the email. Or gave the kid black point and then the kid was unhappy about it and told me. If it did not, that teacher would also send mail, but after like 2-3 points within short period (don't know the exact rules). The other option is to ask in the evening "have you done homework". One of my kids would never lie and other only rarely, so it worked. To add to it, old system wa…

Okay, with this email business we’re back with the “micromanaging”.

Re: Stockholm parents built their own school app, then the city called the cops

#270

Post by urvader »

Fiahil wrote: post #265
bjourne wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But there is no API here. The article makes it clear that you were intercepting client-server communication not meant to be used by third parties in order to write your own client. That it could be used as an API doesn't matter since the intent wasn't to create an API. I could do the same thing and write an app for, say, the tax agency by scraping its website but it would be a legal gray area.

A website is an API (poorly designed). The only way to not make an API out of publicly available data, is to encrypt it. Then nobody can read it unless they have the right keys.

If you encrypt it, you have to, at some point, also send the keys to the user. The key has the same legal protection as the rest of the document so encrypting the data has no implication on the legal discussion.
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