This document discusses cyber safety from a teacher's perspective and outlines several key issues: 1) Personal information security, including location data collected by apps and risks of oversharing on social media. 2) Ownership of personal information online and the importance of separating professional and personal accounts/profiles. 3) Recent studies showing popular apps collect precise location data every few minutes on average. 4) The importance of strong, unique passwords and two-factor authentication to reasonably protect financial assets and accounts.

1. Cyber Safety
From a Teacher’s Perspective

2. What is safety?
● Being secure from fear of personal attack
● Maintaining ownership of your personal
information
● Reasonable assurance that your financial assets
are protected
● Wanting the same for your family and students

3. Personal Attack
Does use of the Internet or cell phone expose your
location, income level, travel routes, accessibility or
any of this same information about those for whom
you care? Are you certain?
4Square - check in location data
Google Maps - location history tracking
Facebook - everything about you
Twitter - your location when you post
Photos - geocoded and time / date information
Waze - your driving route
LinkedIn - your professional business card / resume
Pinterest - what are your tastes?

4. Ownership of personal information
● How much information is stored about you on the
web - Google yourself (is all of this information
considered personal?)
See and control what Google knows about you here:
https://myaccount.google.com/?pli=1
● Account separation - work and / or professional vs.
personal and family (make a distinction). Think
about the use of a personal pseudonym
● Do you blog or tweet and do you make an effort to
separate your professional and personal thoughts?
Disclaimers?
● Does your banking account(s) use your district or
personal email addresses?

5. Location Information
CMU Study
Dozens of smartphone apps collect so much location data that
their publishers can plot users’ comings and goings in detail, a
forthcoming peer-reviewed study found.
Computer scientists at Carnegie Mellon University concluded that
a dozen or so popular Android apps collected device location – GPS
coordinates accurate to within 50 meters – an average 6,200
times, or roughly every three minutes, per participant over a two-
week study period.
Dwoskin, E. (2015). Where Were You 3 Minutes Ago? Your Apps Know. WSJ. Retrieved 2 June 2015,
from http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/03/23/where-were-you-3-minutes-ago-your-apps-know/

6. See where I have been
Courtesy of Google
https://maps.google.com/locationhistory/b/0

7. See where my pictures have been...
Geotagging
http://www.androidcentral.com/manage-location-data-pictures-you-take-privacy-and-
security
Android
http://www.androidcentral.com/manage-location-data-pictures-you-take-
privacy-and-security
and on an iPhone
http://www.igeeksblog.com/disable-geotagging-for-photos-on-iphone-ipad/

8. Is my webcam spying on me?
http://www.howtogeek.com/210921/how-to-disable-your-
webcam-and-why-you-should/
“In 2009, a student sued his school when he discovered his
school-provided laptop was secretly photographing him (the
ensuing legal investigation revealed that the school had
collected 56,000 photographs of students without their
knowledge or consent). In 2013, researchers demonstrated
that they could activate the webcam on MacBooks without
the indicator light turning on, something previously
considered impossible. A former FBI agent confirmed that
not only was this possible but that they’d been doing it for
years.”

9. Reasonable assurance that your
financial assets are protected
●Accounts - what are your major financial accounts
and what safegards do they provide? Do they
accept financial liability in the event of a breach?
●Accessibility - Username / password - 2 step
authentication, site keys and other, http vs. https
●Devices - iPad, PC, Mac, Smartphone, school
computer, spouse work computer
●On what network? Panera, BPSD, Home, Spouses
work, any available?

10. Examples
●PNC Fraud Resolution Page
https://www.pnc.com/en/security-assurance/resolving-fraud.html
●2-step authentication Google style -
●Device safety - Phishing, Pharming and Spyware
https://www.pnc.com/en/security-assurance/detecting-fraud/online-
fraud.html
●On what network? Panera, BPSD, Home, Spouses
work, any available?
http://www.onguardonline.gov/articles/0014-tips-using-public-wi-fi-
networks
● Site encryption - HTTPS vs. HTTP Does HTTPS
mean you are secure - check the cert and every
page

11. Check your encryption!!!

12. First thing to do if you think your
account(s) is / are compromised?
●CHANGE YOUR
PASSWORD(S)
NOW!

13. Password Management
● How do you remember all of your passwords?
o password manager - who wrote the app and WIFT
o spreadsheet - is it stored securely and / or password
protected
o sticky note - nuff said
o let the browser remember them (Chrome is best)
● Are your passwords unique per site? password hash;
i.e.
o www.amazon.com - 123aMaZ45!
o www.facebook.com - 123fAcE45!
o www.twitter.com - 123tWiT45!
o www.ebay.com - 123eBaY45!

14. Password Management w/ Chrome
Find it
under the
Chrome
Menu,
under
Settings,
Advanced,
Password
and Forms,
Offer to
save your
web
passwords
(check the
box)

15. Privacy
Electronic Privacy Information Center - watch this video
https://epic.org/epic/About-EPIC-Video-SD.mp4
How Google uses your data and what you can control
http://www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners/
Android Smartphone permissions
● “Photos/Media/Files: An app that needs to read the
contents of your USB storage or SD card can now format
your entire external storage device”
http://www.howtogeek.com/190863/androids-app-permissions-were-just-
simplified-now-theyre-much-less-secure/
Versus iOS Smartphone permissions
http://www.howtogeek.com/177711/ios-has-app-permissions-too-and-theyre-
arguably-better-than-androids/
Android permissions are more granular and more
difficult to configure - iOS permissions are easy to
configure and understand

16. Knowing which apps are safe
quickly
General guidelines
● Is the publisher well known? i.e. Google or CNN?
● What is the average rating? Never download an app
with less than a 4 star rating
● Did you read the app privacy policy?
● What is the number of ratings - never download an
app with less than several thousand ratings
Alternately use an app rating service; i.e. Common
Sense Media’s Graphite - https://www.graphite.org/
http://online.wsj.com/home-page?lpe=refresh-login
https://www.apple.com/itunes/

17. Student privacy
● What information is required for use of the App /
Site? Name, age, address, phone number
● Do your students meet the app age requirement?
● Are students using the school district provided email
address to register for an account? Have you
requested for us to unblock the registration address?
● Do students produce information while using the app
that if released could impact their’s or their family’s
privacy? I.e. a writing app collecting personal
feelings
● Is student collected information reused, sold or is
their personally identifiable information used for
marketing?

18. Coming changes in privacy laws
http://www.centerdigitaled.com/news/California-Protects-
Student-Data-Privacy-with-Two-Bills.html
These bills address a growing problem of mismanagement of
student data. Federal student privacy legislation including FERPA
and COPPA do address student data privacy, but educators, privacy
advocates, legislators and industry members are split on whether
that legislation does enough to protect privacy in the Digital Age
we live in. While new federal legislation was introduced in late
July, states have been stepping up to deal with the issue by
introducing 110 bills in 36 states this year and signing 28 of them
into law as of August 27, according to the Data Quality Campaign.
"Together, it's really a landmark regulatory scheme," said Joni
Lupovitz, vice president of policy for Common Sense Media, which
supported the [California] bills. "The whole idea is not to stop
education technology; the idea is to create a trusted online
environment so kids can just be kids and focus on learning."

19. What can I do?
● Read the privacy policy of web sites and apps that you or your
students intend to install or use or register
● Help your older students understand the trade offs between
privacy and marketing
● Use complex, hard to guess and unique passwords for each site
you register
● Help students to understand the importance of creating strong
passwords and not sharing them with friends
● Maintain a professional distance between your professional
and personal life
● Help students understand the ramifications of posting too
much or too detailed or inappropriate personal information

20. Sites to help me teach my students
about Internet safety and privacy
● Common Sense Media - AIU affiliation
https://www.commonsensemedia.org/
● NetSmartz Kids - National Center for Missing and
Exploited Children
http://www.netsmartz.org/InternetSafety
● FBI Internet Safety Education - site opens each year
anew in September
https://sos.fbi.gov/
● FBI Internet Safety for younger students
http://www.fbi.gov/fun-games/kids/kids-safety

21. Thank you for your attention!
Ron Reyer, Jr.
Director of Technology Services
Bethel Park School District
301 Church Rd.
Bethel Park, PA 15102
reyer.ron@bphawks.org