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5| O akville B eaver | T hursday,O ctober 18,2018 insidehalton.com For a Free consultation call oakville: 905.842.2022 ToronTo: 416.644.3999 Denied Disabled Benefits? I canhelp. My teamof experienced lawyers can help youwith: •Disability Claims Short-TermDisability, long-TermDisability, CPPShort-TermDisability, long-TermDisability, CPP •Car accidents •Slip and Falls •Wrongful Dismissal Injured? injurY and emploYment law I don't get paid unless I getYoumoneY. oFFiCeS in oakville and ToronTo eMail: sspadafora@slspc.ca Free Light BuLBs For LiFe* We are the region's Best Lighting store - Latest Lighting designs at excLusive pricing! EntirE storE on salE Shop online www.conceptlighting.ca CONCEPT LIGHTING MiSSiSSauga 5980 McLaughLin Rd. #3 905.712.4548 Heartland Centre - next to loblaws Burlington 1515 n. SeRvice Road 905.331.7444 between GuelpH line & brant street oakville 243 SpeeRS Rd. 905.849.lite(5483) Plus take an Extra 20%OFF* *detaiLs in store While looking over the shoulder of his 11-year-old daughter, one Burlington fa- ther noticed that something was not right. His daughter was on the computer at home, signed in on YouTube with a user- name containing her first and last name, accessed us- ing a profile created on her behalf by the Halton District School Board (HDSB). "I noticed my children and their classmates were able to post comments on videos using their user- names containing personal and identifiable informa- tion," he said. The parent, who spoke to the Independent on the promise of anonymity, said that he soon learned the YouTube application, alongYouTube application, alongY with a host of others, was connected to his daughter's G Suite for Education ac- count - a Google suite of ap- plications used by school boards across Ontario. G Suite, which has been vetted by the Ministry of Ed- ucation, aims to provide on- line learning tools for stu- dents growing up in a digital world. In the HDSB, the suite is connected to each student's school profile, which includes the student's first and last name, grade,first and last name, grade,f school location and email - information that is then pro- vided directly to Google. "We don't like that. It's kind of a punch to the gut," the father said, adding that he was never asked to con- sent to his children's use of this suite or its services, or the disclosure of their per- sonal information online. Toronto cyber lawyer Im- ran Ahmad says it is impor- tant for schools to offer cyb- er hygiene training to pro- tect students from online predators and cyberbullies they could encounter through use of certain appli- cations, such as the addi- tional ones offered through G Suite. "At (a young) age, I don't think they can discern and appreciate what the impact of putting their personal in- formation online would be,"formation online would be,"f he said. "So take the exam- ple of a YouTube account. Viewing a video is one thing,Viewing a video is one thing,V but recording yourself and putting it online, that's an- other." Regarding the online safety of students accessing G Suite, HDSB Superinten- dent of Education Gord Truffen cites the Technolo- gy & You portion of the board website, which in- cludes tools for online safe- ty used in Halton class- rooms. "Digital citizenship is something we promote within our schools and teachers do that as well with students," he said. But when it comes to be- ing transparent to parents about the specific ins and outs of G Suite, Truffen says that responsibility falls on individual teachers. "I think we would rely on teachers to communicate that (to parents)," he said. However, in a follow up email Oct. 15, the board's Manager of Communica- tion Services Marnie Den- ton said, "All parents in the Halton District School Board receive a 'Statement of Personal Information' that clearly indicates the use of G Suite in our schools and therefore teachers are not responsible for commu- nicating the use of these apps to parents. "We prefer teachers use the G Suite application over third-party applications," she added. And while Google pro- vides a comprehensive tem- plate for schools to print out and distribute to parents re- garding their child's use of G Suite, the Burlington dad says he has never seen one. G Suite offers students a number of core services, which include Gmail, Cal- endar, Contacts, Classroom, Drive, Docs, Forms, Groups, Sheets, Sites, Slides, Talk/ Hangouts, Vault and Chrome Sync. According to the G Suite school consent form, "user personal information col- lected in the core services is used only to provide the core services." This is not, however, the case with any of the addi- tional services available through the suite, including but not limited to Google Maps, Blogger, Infogram and YouTube. Unlike the core services, these applications will col- lect personal data from us- ers "to provide, maintain, protect and improve (the services), to develop new ones and to protect Google and (its) users." Google continues: "We al- so use this information to of- fer users tailored content,fer users tailored content,f such as more relevant search results. We may com- bine personal information from one service with infor-from one service with infor-f mation, including personal information, from other Google services." And though Google will not specifically target ads to individual elementary and high school students, that doesn't mean that the stu- dents will not receive them at all. The Burlington father found a number of advertis-found a number of advertis-f ing emails sent from third- party applications accessed by his child through her G Suite account, to her HDSB email - a matter he says he finds troubling as hisfinds troubling as hisf daughter is a minor, not able to consent to her informa- tion being used for commer- cial purposes. Truffen says he was un- aware that students may beaware that students may bea receiving advertising emails from these applica- tions, but he would not rule out the possibility. "That's a tough question to answer," he said. "From talking to my managers, the profiles that are on the PARENT SOUNDS THE ALARM ON STUDENTS' ONLINE PRIVACY THROUGH USE OF ONLINE APPS VERONICA APPIA vappia@metroland.com NEWS See ALL, page 50