Privacy please

HOHENSEE: Student Privacy vs. The State

The NH Department of Education (DOE) collects hundreds of data points on every pre-K to 12 grade student in public school, plus 10,000 Education Freedom Account students attending private and home schools. The data is entered into a Statewide Longitudinal Data System (SLDS) and then shared with the federal government and other “designated” private researchers … Read more

NH Constitution

HOHENSEE: Privacy Rights

With State Funding Comes State Regulation Every recipient of a state-funded Education Freedom Account (EFA) is considered to be a “public education student”, even if they attend a private school, according to our former Commissioner of Education. This is because public money is being used to fund their non-public education. A unique student identifier number … Read more

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ADAM DICK: The People Score Two Victories Against Automated License Plate Readers

Eleven years back, John W. Whitehead warned in his weekly column about the danger from government’s proliferating use of automated license plate readers across America. Whitehead included these devices among the tools being employed in the construction of what he termed an “electronic concentration camp.” This “electronic concentration camp,” wrote Whitehead, “as I have dubbed the surveillance … Read more

The Danger in I-Ready Data

To be honest, there is no real online vendor today that protects your child’s personal data that they collect. When you read their privacy statement, it will sound like your child’s personal information is secure, but they won’t tell you that their data is not secure. Many kids in school use I-Ready. I-Ready comes with … Read more

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The Clock Is Ticking on the TikTok Ban

The April 5 deadline for TikTok’s China-based parent company, ByteDance, to divest its holdings or be shut down revives a controversial battle. Free speech advocates and millions of American TikTok users who practically have a codependent relationship with the video-sharing app are facing off with national security concerns and impacts on children’s mental health. Will … Read more

Privacy

Eliminate Student Data Tracking

D.O.G.E. just cut $900 million from an agency, the Institute for Education Sciences (IES), which tracks American student data. Did the cuts go deep enough to eliminate funding for the State Longitudinal Data Systems (SLDS) ? This system tracks student data from all fifty states, despite the fact that the federal government has no constitutional … Read more

IT Cloud Internet

Democrats Put Your ‘Data’ and ‘Privacy’ At Risk – Not Trump or Musk

Democrats fear Elon having access to sensitive information. Too many people combine the terms hack, breach, and leak as synonyms. A data “hack” is intentionally done by an outside source breaking into computer systems with malice intent. Breach is the term being used to make people fear Elon. A data “leak” is the accidental release of information, often due … Read more

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Legislators Push Back On REAL ID

Many a soul has resisted the national call to accept REAL ID in place of most states’ standard driver’s licenses. Every state is in compliance with the federal mandate, though not every driving licensed citizen needs to be. Those concerned about giving more information to the Feds to archive have friends in every state, including … Read more

Testimony: Prohibiting Businesses from Scanning Drivers’ Licenses

HB 77-FN: prohibiting businesses from scanning individuals’ licenses when selling alcohol or tobacco products. Thank you for addressing this issue that threatens the public’s ability to protect against identity theft and other dangers associated with private identifying information.  Since delving into this issue, I have come across other threats to individual’s rights to keep themselves … Read more

IT Cloud Internet

Who Will Protect Student Data? Right Now, No One

Here is my email to Education Commissioner Edelblut and Legislators on the PowerSchool Data Breach: Commissioner Edelblut,  PowerSchool, owned by Bain Capital, experienced an international cybersecurity incident that involved unauthorized access to certain PowerSchool SIS customer data. This has impacted many school divisions across North America. PowerSchool is a 5.6 billion dollar company that lost personal … Read more

New Legislation Could Claw Some of Your Privacy Back

Longtime readers may recall a pair of stories in 2023 regarding state laws and convenience stores scanning the barcodes on people’s driver’s licenses. The outlets had foregone looking at the front to confirm the age for cigarette and alcohol purchases, instead scanning the barcode on the back to pull in that and a pile of … Read more

Night Cap: Are We Still The “Live Free Or Die State”?

We are slipping, folks. Most of us have been proud to live in the state with this distinctive motto. But, is that all it was meant to be…a motto? Let’s talk about this. Last fall I noticed that convenience stores were scanning driver’s licenses for proof of age, whether you were obviously an octogenarian or … Read more

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