Google rejects EFF complaint over student data privacy violations

Google has fought back against a recent complaint filed by the Electronics Frontier Foundation, which alleged that the company has been deceptively violating the privacy of students with its education-focused products. In a blog post, Google reiterated that its services and tools “comply with both the law and our promises…”

Yesterday, the EFF announced that it had requested an investigation by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) against Google. The advocacy group said that the company was collecting and data mining school children’s personal information, including tracking their Internet searches without either the student or parents’ consent. By doing so, the EFF said, Google was violating the Student Privacy Pledge, which is legally enforceable.

When reached for comment at the time, a Google spokesperson defended the company, telling VentureBeat: “Our services enable students everywhere to learn and keep their information private and secure. While we appreciate EFF’s focus on student privacy, we are confident that these tools comply with both the law and our promises, including the Student Privacy Pledge.”

Jonathan Rochelle, the Director of Google Apps for Education, wrote today that Google’s goal has been to ensure that teachers and students everywhere had the access to “powerful, affordable, and easy-to-use tools for teaching, learning, and working together.” Furthermore, he said that the privacy of student information remained paramount.

Rochelle also sought to set the record straight about what Google is doing to ensure that students’ data remains private and secure. When it comes to Google Apps for Education (GAFE), he said data is only used within the services to allow students to collaborate on assignments. He said that no ads are displayed in services like Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Contacts, Vault, or Hangouts.

Part of the EFF’s complaint centered around a feature called Chrome Sync that enables Google account holders to mirror their bookmarks, extensions, apps, and frequently visited pages across Chromebooks or Chrome browsers. Rochelle wrote that the data from Sync is “only used to power features in Chrome for that person.” Additionally, Google’s systems compile data from millions of users of this feature and only non-personally identifiable information is used by the system to “holistically improve the services that we provide.”

Google Sync can be disabled by students and administrators, or users can select what information they want to have synced, Rochelle explained.

GAFE accounts can also be used to access consumer services provided by Google such as YouTube, Maps, Blogger, and Search. However, no personal information about students is used to affect ad targeting — in fact, Rochelle said that in some cases no ads are shown at all.

We have yet to hear from the FTC about what it will do with this complaint, but both sides have already made their positions very clear. We’ll update if we hear back.