Shoddy student data practices by leading tech vendors, the group found, were rampant. As districts across the globe rushed to create digital classrooms, few governments checked to make sure the tech products officials endorsed were safe for children, according to a recent report by the Human Rights Watch. Meanwhile, schools and technology companies have become increasingly entangled - particularly during the pandemic. In the absence of a federal consumer privacy law, the forum argues the pledge grants “an important and unique means for privacy enforcement,” giving the Federal Trade Commission and state attorneys general an outlet to hold education technology companies accountable via consumer protection rules that prohibit unfair and deceptive business practices.įor years, critics have accused the pledge of providing educators and parents false assurances that a given product is safe, rendering it less useful than a pinky promise. The privacy forum, which is funded by tech companies, has long maintained that the pledge is legally binding and offers assurances to school districts as they shop for new technology. Companies that sign the commitment also agree to “maintain a comprehensive security program” to protect students’ personal information from data breaches. Pledge signatories, including Illuminate, have promised they will not sell student data to third parties or use the information for targeted advertising. Through the voluntary pledge, launched in 2014, hundreds of education technology companies have agreed to a slate of safety measures to protect students’ online privacy. Taking action against Illuminate, he said, “would break the pledge’s pretty perfect record for not actually enforcing any kind of sanctions against bad actors.”
“I have never seen anybody get anything more than a slap on the wrist from the actual people controlling the pledge,” said Bill FItzgerald, an independent privacy researcher.
Now, they are questioning whether its response to the massive Illuminate breach will be any different. Its staunchest critics have assailed the pledge as being toothless - if not an outright effort to thwart meaningful government regulation. The pledge, created nearly a decade ago, is designed to ensure that education technology vendors are ethical stewards of kids’ most sensitive data.
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In a twist, the pledge was co-created by the Software and Information Industry Association, the trade group that recognized Illuminate last month as being among “the best of the best” in education technology.
Illuminate did not respond to interview requests. “We have been reviewing the deeply concerning circumstances of the breach and apparent violations of Illuminate Education’s pledge commitments,” Polonetsky said in a statement to The 74. In response to inquiries by The 74, the Future of Privacy Forum, a think tank and co-creator of the pledge, disclosed Tuesday that Illuminate could soon get the boot.įorum CEO Jules Polonetsky said his group will decide within a month whether to revoke Illuminate’s status as a pledge signatory and refer the matter to state and federal regulators, including the Federal Trade Commission, for possible sanctions.
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Illuminate has never disclosed the full extent of the blunder, even as critics decry significant harm to kids and security experts question why the company is being handed awards instead of getting slapped with sanctions.Īmid demands that Illuminate be held accountable for the breach - and for allegations that it misrepresented its security safeguards - the company could soon face unprecedented discipline for violating the Student Privacy Pledge, a self-regulatory effort by Big Tech to police shady business practices. Since that disclosure in New York City schools, the scope of the breach has only grown, with districts in six states announcing that some 3 million current and former students had become victims. Sign up for The 74 NewsletterĪ few months after education leaders at America’s largest school district announced that a technology vendor had exposed sensitive student information in a massive data breach, the company at fault - Illuminate Education - was recognized with the software industry’s equivalent of the Oscars. Get stories like these delivered straight to your inbox.
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