Britain wakes up to school fingerprinting

Here at Big Brother Watch we have been highlighting the problem of schools fingerprinting their students for several months.

The issue first came to our attention when a father in Hove approached Big Brother Watch worried about a scheme in his son's school. We tipped off the local journalist and the school then cancelled their plans. Soon after, a local politician contacted us to promote her own campaign against the use of biometric technology in schools. 

This morning the issue has finally gained nationwide recognition after a debate at the Association of Teachers and Lecturers' annual conference in Liverpool yesterday:

As the Independent reports:

Schools are denying pupils their civil liberties by fingerprinting them without seeking the consent of their parents, teachers warned yesterday.

Around 80 secondary schools have introduced a new method of scanning the thumbs of pupils as part of a biometric system to replace swipe cards for registration, library book borrowing and cashless catering for school meals. The use of fingerprinting comes despite fears – acknowledged by the Information Commissioners' Office – that some parents believe the practice leads to children being "treated like criminals".

There are several reasons why the fingerprinting of children should be opposed. Once this sort of data is handed over, it can never be taken back and schools are simply not equipped to hold biometric data. But our greatest fear is that these schemes are anesthetising future generations to the surveillance state; bringing up children who place little value on the integrity of their unique identifying characteristics.

The Information Commissioner's Office states: "There is nothing explicit in the [Data Protection] Act to require schools to seek consent from all parents before implementing a fingerprinting application. However, unless schools can be certain that all children understand the implications of giving their fingerprints, they must fully involve parents in order to ensure that the information is obtained fairly."

It added that "any use of biometric technologies outside law enforcement" should bear in mind the perception that it stigmatised those having their fingerprints taken.

By Dylan Sharpe

Comments

[Andrew Evans]

The Identity and Passport Service chief executive James Hall once admitted that by fingerprinting children in schools it had helped to erode its connection with criminality so that it will become more acceptable to take the biometrics of the people of this country in the future.

So what better way to for the people of this country to go willingly into this brave new world of surveillance and control than to have the education system of this country prepare them for this prospect.

[expatNL]

"It added that "any use of biometric technologies outside law enforcement" should bear in mind the perception that it stigmatised those having their fingerprints taken."

I think there is more danger of stigmatising those pupils who refuse to have their fingerprints taken.

[Redacted]

Education or grooming?

Just another brick in the wall of institutionalised corruption that we are frantically building.

[Redacted]

expatNL: "stigmatising those pupils who refuse to have their fingerprints taken"

Yes, quite. And this is the subtext of so many bullying policies (ID cards, DNA sampling, airport nudiescanners, blanket surveillance etc. etc.). If you are neither corrupt nor afraid, and you insist on your personal autonomy, then you are a threat to corrupt power. You are in fact the real enemy that they are after, and in effect, these policies force you into the open where you can be identified and, if deemed necessary, put under pressure to submit.

[opsimath]

The Information Commissioner's Office states: "There is nothing explicit in the [Data Protection] Act to require schools to seek consent from all parents before implementing a fingerprinting application."

Ah - the old 'nobody told me not to' ploy, much beloved of ne'er-do-wells the world over.

[AnOn]

And no doubt these fingerprints will have been added to the Contact Point database?