Gaggle student behavioural monitoring

October 2021

According to an investigation by non-profit news site The 74, student safety management company Gaggle routinely monitors almost every aspect of US students' lives, and does so after school hours and over weekends and holidays.

Gaggle uses a combination of AI and human reviewers to police schools for suspicious and harmful content in order to prevent violence and student suicides by monitoring student email accounts, documents, and social media accounts.

The nature and extent of Gaggle's monitoring has resulted in student complaints, and has prompted mental health and privacy advocates to raise their concerns publicly.

The effectiveness of Gaggle's suite of monitoring services are also being questioned. Reports suggest Gaggle's systems have not been independently reviewed or audited.

Operator: Minneapolis High Schools, Williamson County School District, etc
Developer: Gaggle
Sector: Education
Monitor student behaviour
Technology: NLP/text analysis; Computer vision
Surveillance; Privacy; Accuracy/reliability; Appropriateness/need; Effectiveness/value
Opacity: Black box; Existence; Purpose