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Plymouth school’s fingerprinting fun

Childfingerprint No, not a pre-school art class story; rather Estover Community College (soon to be Tor Bridge High) have decided that in addition to the new buildings, equipment and books, some of the £39 million spent on a new refurbishment should be ploughed into sticking all of their children on a biometric database.

As the Plymouth Herald explains:

The school has become one of the few secondaries in the country to install a thumbprint scanner system which pupils can use for registration and for buying food in the new restaurant. Executive principal Graham Browne said: "It is a school of the future. There is so much technology in the new buildings.

"The fact we have a thumbprint scanner system is absolutely fantastic and shows what an amazing school this has become."

Mr Brown said the main reasons for installing it were for "speed and convenience". "It means that registration is no longer a time-consuming distraction at the start of a lesson."

It's been a while since I was at school, but I don't recall thinking that registration was the most time-consuming of daily routines. Similarly, Mr Browne may wish to consult one of the 'few secondaries' with experience of thumbprint scanners and whether they were speedy, convenient or a frequent pain, malfunctioning and expensive waste of time.

But more importantly, we are getting tired of journalists swallowing the "it's only a code, not the fingerprint so it isn't dodgy" line which teachers parrot from scanner salesmen. Put simply, if you know the code, you can change it back to a fingerprint.

This is biometric data collection and worse it is from young people who can't properly object and being done ostensibly for 'their own good.' The Government needs to address this continued practice as a matter of urgency.

By Dylan Sharpe

Posted on September 8, 2010 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Databases, Overbearing state
  • http://ampers.wordpress.com Andrew Ampers Taylor

    I can see the kids using sellotape to collect a signature of someone else to pay for food :-)
    But on a more serious vein, how long will it be before all those thumbprints are lodged on the Police Database?

  • http://www.goingfastgettingnowhere.blogspot.com Richard B

    My last job was in a new startup in the tourism business, and we installed fingerprint scanners for staff timekeeping – state of the art, ultra-reliable, quick, easy etc etc. The damn things never worked properly and people used to have to go miles out of their way to clock in or out at a working machine. Awful things.
    On another point, there is more to a registration period than filling in a register. When I was a teacher I used that short time with my class to do all sorts of admin stuff. Automatic registration would not have been much of a help, as I would havwe wanted to spend time with the class anyway.

  • iamnotacitizeniamanumberfromhell

    Admirable comment from executive principal (whatever the heck that is)
    >>
    “The fact we have a thumbprint scanner system is absolutely fantastic and shows what an amazing school this has become.”
    <<
    Would possibly have been more honourable to say what outstanding teaching facilities and resources we have, where all the children have the opportunity to develop and learn happily.
    At least they have the fallback of being able to sell the code (errh fingerprint) data for a cheap and immoral profit…..
    I presume that the parents are required to give their assent or not to this perverted practice?

  • http://mydogateart.blogspot.com Steve Clement-Large

    This potentially is one of the schools that my 5 year old daughter might attend – biometrics are just another form of long-term citizen surveillance … a plague on it.

  • Purlieu

    Virgin Media in Liverpool require fingerprint for staff to enter the premises, starts in a few days, if not already.

  • http://sbml.wordpress.com SadButMadLad

    My neice’s school uses fingerprint scanners for school meals. She tells me that they don’t work very reliably. It always needs more than one attempt at scanning even after wiping the screen because it’s so gruby. So it always means that the queue is long rather than short. A total disisater. All to stop kids finding out who has free school meals and who’s paid. A simple swipe card would be a lot better and more efficient and reliable. Fingerprint scans are not perfect and the number of false negatives is quite high in real life.
    A point about the coded fingerprint. It is NOT possible to work back from the code to a fingeprint. What can be done with the code is to use it to impersonate the original person, but only if a fingerprint scan is not carried out.

  • Brian P

    This strikes me as an interesting new disease-spreading vector too. Sick child touches the scanner and leaves a little present behind. Not-yet-sick child touches the scanner which then fails (by the sound of it). Child rubs tearful eyes because yet again they will be going hungry…infection is spread.

  • Doug

    My child goes to a school near Plymouth Tavistock College.
    Over my dead body will she be biometrically tagged by the school or anyother body. I’ll not have this done to my child end of.
    This is just training our youngster up to become nice compliant drones when they get older.
    Me I am teaching my child to Rage against the machine which is far safer than compliance not just for her but future society.

  • http://profile.typepad.com/cheryl10 Cheryl

    My daughters school introduced biometric fingerprinting. We didn’t allow her to have her fingerprint taken. Eventually the school relented and allowed her to have a number code. So it is possible to have an alternative for those who don’t agree with fingerprinting.

  • http://profile.typepad.com/clemo Dave

    I wanted to share this on Facebook. However it seems I must consent to allowing typepad to access all my facebook details, including the names of all my friends, likes, etc etc.
    Very ironical don’t you think?

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    Yeah, I strongly agree with you. It seems there are really talented writers who are willing to share a very good articles online.

  • Doug

    One problem
    Even the card system Tavi will be child marked and all the individual food/book choices logged.
    I have spoken to the company who installed the system and there is another option which I am persuing with the school at the moment.
    This is
    an anonymous card with a simple debit credit marker with no food items logged against it.
    But at the moment I have emailed the school to say that “Until they implement such a system my daughter will be allowed free access out of school for the procurement of food/drink with legal tender without fear of survaillence.
    Also I know what data at present is collect by the company and I don’t like it at all!!!!!

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