Teen Vogue: Remote Proctoring Services Are Facing Legal, Legislative Challenges

October 20, 2022

That lack of negotiating power makes students vulnerable, says Sara Geoghegan, counsel for EPIC (Electronic Privacy Information Center), which filed a complaint against five online test-proctoring services claiming they violated students’ privacy rights. She describes her experience taking the 2020 Illinois bar exam, a proctored test she couldn’t object to if she wanted to practice law. Because Geoghegan took the exam from a multiunit housing complex in Chicago, she worried about noise. She posted signs asking people to be quiet, fearful that a post office worker on the phone while delivering mail or a parent talking to a child or a dog barking in a neighboring unit could set off a red flag that she was potentially cheating.

“We should be focused on education, not surveillance,” Geoghegan says. She thinks the pushback against schools and proctoring companies is appropriate. “Students should not have to trade over-broad data collection [as alleged in the EPIC complaint] in order to receive or earn an education.” 

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