How Data Mining Threatens Student Privacy

In recent years, the number of school districts using educational software and cloud services has just exponentially increased. Today, nearly 95 percent of school districts are using these services. These services can provide numerous advantages to school administrators and educators, including individualized learning, State examination assessments and administrative functions such as attendance records. While these services can be helpful to our students' development, it is vitally important that we understand the privacy and security concerns of sharing such sensitive information. A report by the Fordham Law School found that cloud services used by school districts are poorly understood and have a lack of transparency, finding 20 percent of school districts do not have proper policies in place for the use of these services. Fewer than 7 percent restrict the sale of student information by vendors. Cyber criminals have become more sophisticated in their tactics and techniques, evidenced by the increasing number of cyber breaches at universities, schools, and retailers. The more convenienced our lives become with on-line services the greater risk these criminals can exploit it.