Digital Privacy: Can I have your email address and postal code?
Privacy in the digital age can be complicated but it is of critical importance to all of us. The meaning of privacy has most definitely evolved since the digital revolution. This weeks’ blog post is on digital privacy and includes some questions that I want to consider as a classroom teacher.
Is privacy a human right?
Is privacy something we should teach?
What are my responsibilities as a teacher?
What are the responsibilities of my students?
How do students value privacy?
I don’t have any definitive answers to these questions but can offer some ideas based on the research I did and in doing so I came across a wide variety of sources.
Is privacy a human right?
Privacy is in fact a human right. This means that we as digital citizens have the right to maintain privacy and that others are afforded that same right. Considering this, anything posted online deserves careful consideration. “The (United Nations) General Assembly affirmed that the rights held by people offline must also be protected online, and it called upon all States to respect and protect the right to privacy in digital communication” (United Nations General Assembly Resolution Adopted by the General Assembly on 18 December 2013 68/167).
Is privacy something we should teach?
Absolutely and I found several useful tools to help do just that. Because I teach at the secondary level, this resource provided by Media Smarts designed for grades 9-12 seemed like a good starting point. The three case studies cover a variety of different privacy issues including the difference between privacy and security, consideration when posting pictures online and the sharing of personal information. Check out the resource link below.
What are my responsibilities as a teacher?
I have many different digital responsibilities that I consider daily: how I professionally communicate digitally with students, the sharing of student email addresses in group emails, use of cameras and video recorders during class time or on field trips and posting pictures of students for school websites or social media to name a few .
The two videos posted below are from commonsense.org and discuss things that I didn’t know. For example, the “s” at the end of the https means that the site is digitally encrypted and likely more secure. Who knew? (Likely many people)
What are my student’s responsibilities?
This is where we as teachers need to play an important role. As a teacher, one of my concerns is ensuring that my students understand how to protect their privacy and the privacy of others both at school and at home. I need to help them understand their responsibilities and can do that through teaching digital citizenship. I found an interesting framework called the "Personal Data Protection Competency Framework for School Students Designed to Help Educators". This document covers topics such as managing data, privacy, civil liberties and protection of personal data and the digital world: becoming a digital citizen. The framework offers knowledge and skills outcomes and though it isn’t designed to offer activities or lessons, it does offer a starting point for discussion.
And finally do students value privacy or see privacy in a different way?
I think Boyd would say yes. She stated that for teens, “privacy isn’t necessarily something that they have; rather it is something they are actively and continuously trying to achieve in spite of structural or social barriers that make it difficult to do so" (Boyd, 2014, p. 60). Today’s teens seek privacy that may intentionally shut adults out or that may look different from what we as adults expect. In the end, the importance of respecting privacy for themselves and others is a invaluable lesson.
References
Boyd, D. (2014). It's Complicated : the social lives of networked teens. New Haven, CN : Yale University Press.
Common sense education. (n.d.) Protect your students' data and privacy. Retrieved from https://www.commonsense.org/education/teaching-strategies/protect-your-students-data-and-privacy
International conference of privacy and data commissioners. (2016). Personal Data Protection Competency Framework for School Students. Retrieved from https://icdppc.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/International-Competency-Framework-for-school-students-on-data-protection-and-privacy.pdf
Media Smarts (2016). The privacy dilemma lesson plan. Retrieved from http://mediasmarts.ca/sites/mediasmarts/files/pdfs/lesson-plan/Lesson_Privacy_Dilemma.pdf
United Nations General Assembly. (2014). Resolution Adopted by the General Assembly on 18 December 2013 68/16. The right to privacy in the digital age. Retrieved from http://undocs.org/A/RES/68/167
Digital Privacy Image Source: Google Images