[Infowarrior] - Illinois law mandates students' social media password turnover

[Richard Forno]

Illinois law mandates students' social media password turnover
updated 11:46 am EST, Wed January 21, 2015

http://www.electronista.com/articles/15/01/21/orwellian.law.demands.passwords.if.school.officials.request.them/

Orwellian law demands passwords if school officials request them

A law that came into effect on January 1 in Illinois is riling up parents of students in the state. Public Act 098-0801, ostensibly passed to cut down on school-age bullying, mandates that school authorities may demand a student or a parent to surrender social media account information, including passwords, if school officials believe that there has been a violation of school rules or procedures. The law applies even to accounts or postings not on school grounds, and made at any time or place. Furthermore, failure to comply will induce a criminal charge for the student, the parents, or both.

A letter sent to parents in the state states that "If your child has an account on a social networking website, e.g., Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, ask.fm, etc., please be aware that State law requires school authorities to notify you that your child may be asked to provide his or her password for these accounts to school officials in certain circumstances." No subpoena or warrant is required for the demand, just the agreement of school officials. The agreement process isn't codified in the law, and is left up to school districts to decide what is considered "certain circumstances."

Superintendant of the Triad district Leigh Lewis in Illinois told Motherboard that there could be criminal charges if parents fail to comply. Lewis said that "if they didn't turn over the password, we would call our district attorneys because they would be in violation of the law. That would only be in some cases -- we'd certainly look at the facts and see what we're dealing with before we make the decision."

The Illinois law flies in the face of other states' laws, and may not even be constitutional. The act of handing over a password is against most services' terms of service. It is unclear what decision making process is required for passwords to be demanded, or what criteria law enforcement would be notified of a failure to comply with the password turn-over demand.

Lewis says that the school is in "the business of protecting kids" and that the law assists in this goal. She added that she has absolutely no issue with the law, as "if there's a disruption to school, if there are threats or discrimination of any type that fall under bullying and harassment policies we have, we have to follow through and investigate," she said.