On Sun, Feb 21, 2010 at 4:56 PM, Robert Michael Abrams <bath...@cwo.com> wrote:
> I was sort of waiting for this very thing to come up, here. I'm also on > 2400 Fulton, the Jefferson Airplane list, and this case is there being much > and hotly discussed. Here is what a spokesman, a Mr. Young of the Lower Merion School District had to say about this: "Young declined to directly say whether the program was activated in this instance to locate a missing laptop. He said the district only activates it when there is a reported missing laptop, and urged Threat Level to draw its own inferences.” I think that the key words here are "reported missing." The school district says that the surveillance system is only used if a laptop were to be reported as lost, stolen or missing. So, what is the difference between a computer that is lost or one that is missing? Not much, really, if any, so why the apparent differentiation? Additionally, what party reports a computer as being missing, the student or the computer security team that the school employs? It is possible that the school system wirelessly polls computers that have been distributed, perhaps randomly, and if contact with a given computer cannot be made, then that computer is regarded as being "missing." After all, the term "missing" may not necessarily refer to a physical inability to locate the computer, but rather to an inability of the school system to be able to make electronic contact with it. Polling then continues until contact can be made, and the school system will then verify contact by activating the camera or otherwise remotely accessing the computer in order to see what the computer is doing. Steve ************************************************************************* ** List info, subscription management, list rules, archives, privacy ** ** policy, calmness, a member map, and more at http://www.cguys.org/ ** *************************************************************************
