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It discusses software being marketed by several companies to UK (and US) schools to monitor the internet communications of pupils, some as young as four, for signs of (religious) "radicalisation."
The software simplistically monitors for lists of words and phrases such as "Jihobbyist," dodgy organisations, and the names of various ISIS propaganda videos.
For example: John Cantlie, War on Islam, Jihobbyist, Pogrom, YODO, Storm Front, Kuffs, Message to America.
When use of such a term is detected, a screenshot can be forwarded to a teacher. Perhaps the teacher should then dial 999 and ask for the police?
A jihobbyist is someone who sympathises, but rather than getting themselves stuck somewhere warm and sunny like Iraq or Syria, they instead only cheer them on from the comfort of their own home. You learn something new every day.
I suspect some companies are going to make a lot of money out of this — and young children are going to have much fun winding up the teachers.
Original Submission
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 13 2015, @10:31PM
Yes, the crazy thing here is that high-school kids use the internet as part of their schooling.
You two are fucktarded.
(Score: 1) by turgid on Sunday June 14 2015, @10:51AM
The story specifically mentions that the monitoring software is being used in primary schools. Let me translate that into American for you: kids from the ages of 4 to 12 years are on the Internet and being monitored.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 3, Insightful) by mojo chan on Monday June 15 2015, @12:01PM
It's perfectly possible for children of those ages to use the internet safely. Some AV software and ad blocking for protection, and an open classroom where everyone can see what they are doing. Like the real world, there is bad stuff out there but that's why children are supervised. It only becomes a problem when you want to rely on software to do the supervision.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)