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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

#341

Post by tofflos »

henrikschroder wrote: post #328
tofflos wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Edit 1: I figured I should back this up with a source but all the ones I could find are written in Swedish. So either accept my translation or ask a trustworthy Swede to translate it for you. > Skolbetyg är allmänna handlingar, och vem som helst kan beställa fram betyg från arkiven. Journalister brukar t ex ofta vilja se på nytillträdda ministrars skolbetyg. Source https://riksarkivet.se/skolbetyg Translation: S…

The example you're talking about is for adults who have been out of school for a while. I'm pretty sure you can't request information about minors, so you can't look up the grades of your neighbour's kids or something like that.

Here is the form: https://sok.stadsarkivet.stockholm.se/Betygsformular

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

#342

Post by munk-a »

withinboredom wrote: post #300
munk-a wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's one possible issue though - I asked (in another sibling comment) if `ls` could be considered a filesystem API - I strongly believe it is. That means we probably (for sanity's sake) need to differentiate internal vs. external APIs and provide a method for safely allowing this public document method to be well defined. If a spy is filling out an expense report via secure email after an undercover mission to Norw…

In this particular example, It’s likely none of that would be digital (over the web) and it would be classified.

Possibly? Or maybe they use a web based expense reporting system like almost everybody in the modern world. I also think it's a pretty open argument whether the definition of what is and isn't an API relies on things being served on the web.

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

#343

Post by nybble41 »

urvader wrote: post #270
Fiahil wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

> If you encrypt it, you have to, at some point, also send the keys to the user.

Not if you're using a public key cryptosystem and the user generates their own private key. Only the public part is communicated (from the user to the source of the information), and that isn't enough to decrypt the document.

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

#344

Post by monocasa »

randomswede wrote: post #321
munk-a wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't disagree (though when it comes to this particular case it's a question of what the opinion of Swedish courts is) but there's just a lot of grey area there. Would you consider `ls` an API for exposing your filesystem?

I would consider "ls" a presentation tool that uses an API to present information about a file system. I would consider stat/lstat/opendir/readdir/closedir the API that "ls" use to gather the information.

When you combine it with shell scripts, I'd say that ls is an API to itself.

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

#345

Post by renewiltord »

watwut wrote: post #319
renewiltord wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

In which alternative universe is teacher telling parent that homework 7 years old was not done micromanaging? Even among adults, analyst telling project manager you are not doing tasks right is not micromanaging. Or your peer developer telling pm your quality of work is bad. It is completely absurd. The whole point of child raising is to raise the child. Not to go "kiddy, if you are not born organized and attentive,…

Actually, I agree with that position, which is why I started this sub thread curious about how this comment played out https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29108069

My point is that by the standards of that comment, you are micromanaging. I think those standards are ridiculous, though.

Plainly, parents of successful kids are all very involved. This sort of “you sink or swim on your own merits” nonsense is moronic bullshit.

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

#346

Post by toolz »

bjourne wrote: post #339
krageon wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you may be guilty of data breach. No, you may not in this case :) That is why people keep emphasising the way in which the data was published. This is Sweden, not the US. > the city didn't publish their information through an API Yes, they did. > and also explicitly stated that they did not want Christian's app to access their information If you cannot reasonably be said to have circumvented any technical measures…

> No, you may not in this case :) That is why people keep emphasising the way in which the data was published. This is Sweden, not the US. Here is the relevant paragraph: "För dataintrång döms den som olovligen bereder sig tillgång till en uppgift som är avsedd för automatisk behandling eller olovligen ändrar, utplånar, blockerar eller i register för in sådan uppgift" The requisites are: "olovligen", "bereder sig til…

(translated to english)

>For data intrusion, a person who illegally prepares access to information that is intended for automatic processing or illegally changes, deletes, blocks or registers such information is sentenced

This app does not appear to meet this definition as the data they are exposing is not intended for automatic processing, but it is exposing manually consumed data (i.e. the parents were already consuming this data manually) in a different, more accessible way.

I agree the city obviously wasn't intending to expose an API.

Which precedents are you talking about. I don't know much of anything about Swedish law so any precedent you can show would be educational for me.

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

#347

Post by KajMagnus »

krageon wrote: post #331
KajMagnus wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We have quoted a fixed sum per month for that service and we plan to use that money to reimburse everyone sending PR:s we merge How interesting :- ) I wonder how you'll distribute the thanks-for-the-feature (PR) money — e.g. per PR, or per lines (hmm I guess not) or maybe some impact / "severity" system like for bug bounties? (but this time "feature bounties") (From Sweden me too. How nice that you built the app an…

If you view your idealised version of the app as "the app" and everywhere it doesn't currently match reality as a bug, you can just use a bug bounty system for it and it will make intuitive sense for everyone :)

When writing the first line in a new project,

one in an instant adds thousands of bugs :- )

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

#348

Post by henrikschroder »

tofflos wrote: post #341
henrikschroder wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The example you're talking about is for adults who have been out of school for a while. I'm pretty sure you can't request information about minors, so you can't look up the grades of your neighbour's kids or something like that.

Here is the form: https://sok.stadsarkivet.stockholm.se/Betygsformular

Right, ok, but you can only request final grades. So you can only do this once on 15-year-olds, after they've finished primary school. And the next time you can do this on a person, they're gonna be 18 and have graduated high school.

I thought the primary school final grades were protected until you're an adult, but apparently not.

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

#349

Post by NaturalPhallacy »

moogly wrote: post #195
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.

What I want to know: did they have to fill in their time reports in 8+ systems, one worse than the other? When I was a subcontractor, the most I had to do was 3 (customer and 2 consultancies), and even that was a major hassle.

>What I want to know: did they have to fill in their time reports in 8+ systems, one worse than the other?

OMG, I do not miss filling out three fucking timesheets as a salaried employee.

One via MS Access, which was believe it or not, the least painful. One on fucking paper, because why shouldn't programmers use paper for timesheets? And last, but definitely not least one via PHONE. Where you have to enter your employee number and hours via a fucking PHONE KEYPAD. Oh, and they would nag a company of 250,000 to do it early so that the accounting team of like 5 could go home on time on Friday.

One of the many reasons I don't miss that job.

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

#350

Post by moffkalast »

falcolas wrote: post #113
moffkalast wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And quite the opposite, it reinforces the idea that they don't need to remember it so they never will.

Are you able to tell us, without looking at your calendar, every meeting you have for the next week, every assigned task without consulting your task manager, all without fail and with perfect recall of the details? Expecting more from a child's brain than you do of yourself is folly.

Well I specifically can tell you every meeting and assigned task, but that's because the meetings are at standard hours and I work on larger open ended projects.

I was also absolutely terrible at remembering what's for homework and when the school exams are... so I learned to write it all down in a notebook so I didn't miss anything. No fancy parent control required. That was basically standard practice ingrained from first grade onwards.

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