Fingerprint scanning pulled from Valley schools
Arizona school district began to fingerprint students without notifying parents, or asking for the parents’ permission; the parents rebelled, the State Senate is discussing a bill to outlaw such fingerprinting, and the school district retreated: Fingerprinting will stop, and the fingerprint database will be deleted
When Shirley Wallace found out her kids were fingerprinted at school, she got angry. “Since when does anyone have the right to fingerprint our children, especially without parents’ permission?” Yesterday she received good news. “I was hoping to get a good response, but I got more than I expected.” Espiritu Community Schools in Phoenix used biometrics technology to scan the fingerprints of students. School officials argued it was a way to keep track of school lunches so they can receive federal aid. This past week, however, in a letter sent to all parents, the district states it was stopping the use of this technology. The letter states they will “yield the use of the biometrics finger scan system”. They are replacing it with student ID cards.
Fred Bellamy, a Phoenix attorney who specializes in technology law, says fingerprinting children is an invasion of privacy. “Once the data are captured no matter what kind of promises the vendor may make there is a serious risk, and I think the parents have every reason to be concerned about how this data will ultimately be used.” Fernando Ruiz, a director at the school, last month admitted they never notified the parents before taking the kids’ fingerprints. Ruiz said today’s change was because the smaller kids were not operating the scanner properly.
Thursday, Senator Karen Johnson submitted a bill which would make it illegal for any school to collect biometrics information from students. This includes fingerprinting, voice and facial recognition and retinal scans. Wallace hopes this news spreads to across the country, “And really make parents aware of privacy issues having to do with this type of futuristic technology.” Espiritu schools said they would delete all the information they collected for the fingerprint biometrics system.
