PA school spying via laptops: Some technical details

[jeff47]

http://strydehax.blogspot.com/2010/02/spy-at-harrington-high.html

Quoting:
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This investigation into the remote spying allegedly being conducted against students at Lower Merion represents an attempt to find proof of spying and a look into the toolchain used to accomplish spying. Taking a look at the LMSD Staff List, Mike Perbix is listed as a Network Tech at LMSD. Mr. Perbix has a large online web forum footprint as well as a personal blog, and a lot of his posts, attributed to his role at Lower Merion, provide insight into the tools, methods, and capabilities deployed against students at LMSD. Of the three network techs employed at LMSD, Mr. Perbix appears to have been the mastermind behind a massive, highly effective digital panopticon.

The primary piece of evidence, already being reported on by a Fox affiliate, is this amazing promotional webcast for a remote monitoring product named LANRev. In it, Mike Perbix identifies himself as a high school network tech, and then speaks at length about using the track-and-monitor features of LanRev to take surreptitious remote pictures through a high school laptop webcam. A note of particular pride is evident in his voice when he talks about finding a way outside of LANRev to enable "curtain mode", a special remote administration mode that makes remote control of a laptop invisible to the victim.

<...>

It isn't until 37 minutes into the video till Perbix begins talking about the Theft Tracking feature, which causes the laptop to go into a mode where it beacons its location and silent webcam screenshots out to an Internet server controlled by the school.

The beacon feature appears to have been one of the primary methods for remote spying, however, network footprints abound over the details and architecture of the remote administration effort. In this post, Perbix discusses methods for remotely resetting the firmware lockout used to prevent jailbreaking of student laptops. A jailbreak would have allowed students to monitor their own webcam to determine if administrators were truly taking pictures or if, as the school administration claimed, the blinking webcams were just "a glitch."

Perbix also maintains a prolific blog, where in this blog post he describes using the remote monitoring feature to locate a stolen laptop

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It looks like a tech might have not thought about all the implications of his 'anti-theft feature'.

[xultar]

1. There are plenty of ways to track a laptop without using a camera...furthermore

the feature should only be available after a laptop is reported stolen

The guy is an effin idiot.

[bananas]

3. They've admitted to using it to observe "wrongdoing" by the students

What they consider "wrongdoing" will be interesting to find out.
Also, the students had to use these laptops - they couldn't use their own laptops.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=4281815&mesg_id=4282022

"Technicians said they have activated the technology 42 times this year to take photos of suspects believed to be damaging laptops or otherwise committing wrongdoing — precisely the reason they turned it on the case of the 15-year-old Harriton High School student now pressing charges."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=4281815&mesg_id=4282164

* Possession of a monitored Macbook was required for classes
* Possession of an unmonitored personal computer was forbidden and would be confiscated
* Disabling the camera was impossible
* Jailbreaking a school laptop in order to secure it or monitor it against intrusion was an offense which merited expulsion

In other words, using your own PC was forbidden, and disabling the spy-ware was an expelling offense.

[xultar]

4. Oh, I know that. I'm just sayin if they were really just concerned about theft...

there were other options.

[jmowreader]

5. We know eating Mike and Ikes constitutes wrongdoing in their eyes

Because that's what the kid who set the whole firestorm off was doing.

[pokerfan]

12. Interesting how their story keeps changing

Last week the said it was only activated to find stolen or lost computers. Now it's damaging and wrongdoing? What does that mean? If a student dings his laptop, do they start taking pictures?

[GodlessBiker]

2. Wow. That is not good for the school district.

[sam sarrha]

6. apparently the school never approved any webcam to be used.. i saw an interview and the school rep

and she kept saying no approval was ever given.. interviewer said but screen shots were made and parents told their kid was using drugs.. it was candy.. the school rep simply repeated..'No approval was issued to take any screen shots.' so it looks like perhaps someone over stepped their authority. or at least didn't get approval in writing.

[GodlessBiker]

7. "Respondeat superior" will snag the school district and make it responsible for its employees'...

actions.

[ret5hd]

So your contention (or, at least, the schools contention)...

is that a "screen shot" was taken (ok, pause here: a screen is a picture of what is currently displayed on the computer screen, not a web-cam picture) of a student eating candy and said picture was used by the school administration to punish a student BUT said picture was not authorized by the school so someone stepped over their authority.

Does anyone else see the complete ludicrousness (on many many levels) of the above statement?

[jeff47]

15. No.

A screen shot was taken IN ADDITION TO a picture using the camera.

The "screen shot" is all done within the computer. It does not involve a camera. If you're running Windows, you can take a screen shot by hitting the "Print Screen" key on your keyboard. To see the screen shot, open up your start menu, go to Accessories->Paint. Edit menu and hit "paste". Ta-da! Your screen, no camera.

The problem is that it ALSO took a picture using the camera of whatever happened to be in front of the computer. The camera is pointed away from the computer, not at the screen.

[ret5hd]

10. dupe

[ThomCat]

11. But their computers AUTOMATICALLY took screen shots

EVERY TIME the computer came out of sleep mode. So there is no way they can say they don't authorize the use of the cameras. It would have been impossible for anyone to use the computers without repeatedly using the cameras, and they must have known this.

[sam sarrha]

16. the woman was apparently saying the didnt take pictures from the camera, ..screen shots dont use a

camera, it is just a copy of the page on the screen, like what you would see if you saved a page to your favorites. however if the kid was using the screen as a mirror with the webcam of course there will be an image of what the web cam is focused on, but it is still a screen shot and not a photo... but the auto program didnt activate the camera, the child did.. no fault. it was still a screen shot.. i think the contract would/should have been explicit about how it was to be used... as a study tool, not a mirror

do you know the difference between a screen shot and a web cam photo.?? 2 different things.. only the latter uses a camera.

unless the screen is being used as a mirror thru the webcam..

[ThomCat]

17. The block studying the specs of this thing says it activates the camera.

It can ALSO capture the screen shot. So it can do both.

[sam sarrha]

18. point was, Mike Perbix looks like the lose cannon without suppervision and not the administration

[ThomCat]

20. Not according to the people disecting this thing on other blogs.

First of all, if you think a screen shot will capture reflections, you don't know enough to be making judgments. Let other people figure things out. :eyes:

Second of all, if you believe administrative denials just because they say so, please don't sit on any juries.

[Spike89]

21. Confusion over screen shot

As many people have pointed out, a screen shot is different than a web camera shot...BUT, the issue here is remote viewing of the Web camera on another computer. The person spying would take a screen shot of their own computer screen as it was displaying the spy feed.

It is simple, it is a screen shot of the spy's computer, showing the video image from the kid's laptop.

[tammywammy]

8. This is just getting worse and worse n/t

[HysteryDiagnosis]

9. IP address is all you will ever need. Idiots.

:popcorn:

[Quantess]

13. Mr. Perbix

is a great name for spoofing. We just know they call him Mr. Pervix or Mr. Pervert.

[TheMadMonk]

14. Anything which CAN be abused WILL be abused.

And at least in some ways, it can be argued that the far more dangerous abuser here is not the postulated creepy perv with a pot of hand creme and a serious trip hazzard, but the actual moral watchdog suffering under the delusion that they have their victim's best interest at heart.

One thing I find quite intersting. The sudden deafening silence from a couple of extremely vocal individuals.

[sam sarrha]

19. that is called the "Iron Law of Oligarchy"..