In 2010, a lawsuit was filed by a high school student and his parents against the Lower Merion School District of Ardmore, Pa., charging them with spying on students and their families. Approximately 1,800 students at the district’s two high schools had been given laptops as part of a state- and federally-funded education initiative. Michael and Holly Robbins said they first found out about the spying after their son Blake (pictured) was accused by a Harriton High School official of “improper behavior in his home” and shown a photograph taken by his laptop. An assistant principal at Harriton later confirmed that the district could remotely activate the webcams in students’ laptops and could capture whatever images were in front of the webcams, all without the knowledge or consent of the students or their parents. The school district was charged with violation of the federal Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) and other federal and state statues, including the Pennsylvania Wiretapping and Electronic Surveillance Act. In the end, the school district agreed to pay $610,000 in damages, and “WebcamGate” became a part of history.
