Minneapolis schools are spying on queer students & outing them to teachers and parents

The software has outed one student and also incorrectly notified a transgender teen’s parents after they wrote about their past suicidal thoughts.

Minneapolis schools are spying on queer students & outing them to teachers and parents

Since spring 2020, Minneapolis schools have been using an online surveillance application called Gaggle to spy on students’ online activity. The software flags LGBTQ-related terms and has already reported outed at least one LGBTQ student to their parents.

Gaggle monitors students’ online behavior 24 hours a day and seven days a week, by tracking their school-issued Google and Microsoft accounts. Such accounts are likely to be used more often by poor students who lack personal home computers.