Room Scanning For Online Testing Ruled Unconstitutional

he case hinged on siding with one of two interests: student privacy versus school testing integrity. The school used third-party online proctoring provider Honorlock to record and store scans of each student’s room before testing. 

• Student Position: His Fourth Amendment rights, which protected against “unreasonable search and seizure”, were violated. Not only were filmed scans visible to school officials but classmates as well. The school did not have reasonable suspicion of uncovering wrongdoing.

• School Position: Cleveland State defended itself by saying the proctoring tech was in ‘general use’, that the scan was brief (10 seconds to one minute) and was directed by the student himself, meaning he was able to decide what to depict in his room and where in the home to take the test. 

Lead counsel Matthew Besser argued, “The Framers would have recoiled at the idea of a school official physically entering a student’s home without a warrant to preemptively search for evidence the student might cheat on a test. CSU’s use of webcams to snoop inside student homes is no different. It is an unnecessary and unreasonable intrusion on student privacy, and it violates the Fourth Amendment.”

Judge Calabrese agreed: “Mr. Ogletree’s subjective expectation of privacy at issue is one that society views as reasonable and that lies at the core of the Fourth Amendment’s protections against governmental intrusion. "Rooms scans go where people otherwise would not, at least not without a warrant or an invitation.”

Rosalyn doesn’t require room scans. Not only do students find them invasive, but they aren’t even effective. If students want to cheat, they’ll simply not include their cheating method in their room scan, which is easy to do since it’s directed by the student. 

Excluding room scans does not decrease anti-cheating software effectiveness: Why? Because it detects what occurs during cheating: looking away from screens for extended periods, talking, or the presence of another individual in the room (who would, quite obviously, enter the room following a room scan anyway).
Organizations can detect and deter cheating while still being BIPA compliant and, beyond that, respectful as a common courtesy. ‍‍

Rosalyn doesn’t just believe that, it’s proven it.

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https://www.npr.org/2022/08/25/1119337956/test-proctoring-room-scans-unconstitutional-cleveland-state-university

https://knpr.org/npr/2022-08/scanning-students-rooms-during-remote-tests-unconstitutional-judge-rules

https://bbgohio.com/blog/landmark-student-privacy-victory/

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