School IT Techs In Webcam Spying Case On Leave

Blake Robbins

The two school IT techs in the Blake Robbins v. Lower Merion School District have been placed on leave, in the fall out from the horrible invasion of privacy case, that saw a 15-year-old boy, photographed unaware in his own bedroom, by a webcam on a Harriton High School issued laptop.

Michael Perbix and Carol Cafiero have been placed on administrative leave and are stating the school ordered them to turn the cameras on each time. On March 6, 2010, they admitted the webcams are programmed to snap photographs of laptop users anywhere they are located "every 15 minutes."

The school IT Techs confessions on March 6, 2010 confirms what the Judiciary Report previously stated on February 22. 2010 in the article titled School’s Illegal Defense For Spying On Kids In Their Homes With Webcams, in that webcams with spyware attached to them, will trigger at timed intervals, as they currently cannot know when someone is seated in front of the unit doing drugs, as the school alleged regarding 15-year-old Blake Robbins, which turned out to be candy, not illegal pills.

Mike Perbix, computer administrator at Harriton High School

This means, as the site previously surmised, there is more than one photo of Blake and other students, who were caught unaware, when the school triggered the webcams to start snapping photos of them in different situations, without their permission or that of their parents.

That's called voyeurism and it is illegal in America. It also constitutes illegal wiretapping, as webcams come standard with sound and video. The intent to violate the law is clearly there, as meetings were taken before this spying program was implemented.

Oh and in more bad news, Lower Merion School District is not the only learning institution in the nation with such surreptitious spying capabilities installed on laptops.

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Police get Webcam pictures in school spy case

March 6, 2010 1:12 PM PST - Two IT employees at Pennsylvania's Lower Merion School District have been put on administrative leave, and pictures taken from Webcams on school-issued computers have been turned over to the local police department, according to the attorney of one of the employees now on leave.

Attorney Charles Mandracchia, who represents school district information coordinator Carol Cafiero, told Philadelphia TV station Fox 29 that that "they had a private Web site for some of these pictures for the Lower Marion Police Department to view and they were the only ones who could view it."

In February, the family of Blake Robbins, a 15-year-old student at Harriton High School filed a civil complaint in federal court against the district for allegedly using the Webcam on his school-issued laptop to take a photo of the student while he was at home. The district contends that cameras were only activated if a laptop had been reported lost or stolen. The district has since stopped using the tracking software to activate Webcams.

Speaking about his client and Michael Perbix, the other suspended IT staff member, Mandracchia said, "It was their duty to turn on the camera, but they would only do that if they received a request from the two high schools." He also said the pictures were "taken by the computer itself...every 15 minutes once the computer was open, but it was only supposed to be done if the computer was lost or stolen."...

http://news.cnet.com