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Is 'cyber spying' legal for schools?

Police using social networking sites to keep tabs on students' behavior.

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By John Nolan, Staff Writer 10:54 PM Sunday, April 26, 2009

Dayton area teens who use the Web to communicate with their friends could be in for a surprise if their postings include activities that break school rules.

Police officers assigned to schools in the region say they go online to check social networking sites and have found evidence of students bullying others, making threats and planning fights.

John Simmons, safety and security coordinator at Miami Valley Career Technology Center in Englewood, said he has personal MySpace and Facebook accounts and that he checks traffic on Yahoo! YouTube, AOL, Instant Messengers and other networks.

His vocational school assigns wireless laptop computers to each of its nearly 2,000 high school-age students.

Simmons, who is also a part-time Clayton police detective, said he has a legal obligation to enforce laws that require the school to ensure computer safety for its students, and to learn whether students are using the equipment for bad behavior or getting access to inappropriate Web sites.

Students who go astray can risk suspension, expulsion or even face charges in courts if the offenses are serious enough, Simmons said.

Springboro police Sgt. Don Wilson, assigned to the Springboro City Schools as a resource officer, said he doesn’t look at social networking sites all the time.

“But every now and again, I’ll just log in and look around at our students,” Wilson said.

“We’ve found cases of bullying in our district, and in other districts. I’ve broken up fights.”

Some social networking sites are accessible by anybody. But others, such as Facebook, are restricted to those to whom the page creator has granted access.

Police need to exercise restraint in developing suspicions on the basis of what is said on social networking sites, said Carrie Davis, a staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio.

“Really, what they’re doing is using people’s speech and associations as a basis for suspicion,” Davis said.

It is a challenge for law enforcement because technology has developed at a rate that outpaced the laws, she said.

“They’re dealing with technologies that didn’t exist when the laws were written,” Davis said. “Most of our privacy laws were written in the 1970s.”

In Kettering, there have been occasional problems with seniors at Fairmont High School using networking sites to make bullying or threatening comments, said patrolman Michael Burke, spokesman for Kettering police. Those students are warned to stop or potentially face charges of menacing or harassment, Burke said.

Users of social networking sites that are widely accessible should remember that they are on public forums, Oakwood police Chief Alex Bebris said.

“A constitutional right only exists where there’s an expectation of privacy,” Bebris said.

Police usually find out from teachers or students about the cyber misbehavior of other students, said Scott Ebright, spokesman for the Ohio School Boards Association.

“It’s usually a case where someone spills the beans on them, and then teachers or administrators get wind of it,” Ebright said. “Teenagers don’t keep secrets real well.”

The statewide association plans workshops on cyber law in Columbus and Cleveland in May, to help school boards keep pace with the evolving technology and issues, Ebright said.

Contact this reporter at

(937) 225-2242 or jnolan

@DaytonDailyNews.com.

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