EDITORIAL: Many parents will welcome the idea that a school would insist "spyware" be loaded on its students' phones if they want to bring them to school. Others will say it is a gross intrusion of a young person's privacy. It certainly is that.
The spyware that must be loaded onto the phones of Birkenhead College students would be far more intrusive than an app that merely blocks access to unsavoury material. The "Family Pack" programme described in the Herald yesterday would sort websites into risk categories and send parents an alert when the child has tried to access a high-risk site. It would also send parents a weekly report of the sites their child has visited.
This goes further than the needs of the school, whose WiFi blocks undesirable sites. The school is clearly acting in the interests of parents, helping them control a child's internet access out of school hours.
A Council for Liberties spokesman believes the use of a phone outside the school is no business of the school and he may be right. But the school is making it easier for parents who might be reluctant to raise this subject with their child, and giving the child an incentive to accept the safeguard. If they want to use their own devices at school, rather than the school computers, they must load the app that reports their activity to a parent.
It removes the parent's need to suggest they distrust the child and reduces the child's risk of exposure to harm. All schools should consider it.
