Student suspended for refusing to wear RFID tracker lost lawsuit.

How far are we willing to go to protect our children? Do we trample their rights in the hope of making them safer? In the wake of serious school violence and tragedy, many would probably say we can't possibly go too far.

But at a magnet school in San Antonio, Texas, the recently launched Student Locator Project is putting that idea to the test. It's a year-long pilot program tracking the on-campus location of 4,200 middle and high school students - requiring them to wear SmartID card badges with embedded radio frequency identification (RFID) tracking devices. The movements of the kids are being followed everywhere they go on school grounds, from the lunch room to the bathroom.

That's right, San Antonio's Northside School District - with 100,000 students total, the fourth-largest in the Lone Star State - is tracking students much the same way scientists follow endangered species. Or deliveries. Or sex offenders. This isn't the first time tracking tags have been given to students, but unlike most earlier programs, this one is mandatory: It's happening whether students - or their parents - are okay with it or not.

And it's all perfectly legal. A judge in Texas ruled on Tuesday that because students are on school property, the district has the right to enforce this rule. Caught in the middle is a 15-year-old sophomore named Andrea Hernandez, who was expelled for refusing to wear the badge. Her reasoning was deeply personal. She says it violates her religious beliefs.

Hernandez, a devout Christian, viewed the badge as a mark of the beast, and her father filed suit. But U.S. District Judge Orlando L. Garcia disagreed, calling the badge a "secular choice rather than a religious concern." His ruling forces Hernandez to make a choice: She now has until the end of the current semester - January 18 - to provide written notice to the school as to whether she will wear the badge. (In a key concession, the district offered to let her wear a badge without the tracking chip, but she has so far refused.)

Hernandez's legal representation, the civil-liberties-focused Rutherford Institute, requested a temporary injunction to the district's move while it prepares an appeal. Rutherford attorneys say that "the school’s attempts to penalize, discriminate and retaliate against Andrea violate her rights under Texas’ Religious Freedom Act and the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution."

Radio-frequency identification devices are a daily part of the electronic age — found in passports, and library and payment cards. Eventually they’re expected to replace bar-code labels on consumer goods. Now schools across the nation are slowly adopting them as well.

Tagging school children with RFID chips is uncommon, but not new. A federally funded preschool in Richmond, California, began embedding RFID chips in students’ clothing in 2010. And an elementary school outside of Sacramento, California, scrubbed a plan in 2005 amid a parental uproar. And a Houston, Texas, school district began using the chips to monitor students on 13 campuses in 2004.

The Northside Independent School District in San Antonio began issuing the RFID-chip-laden student-body cards when the semester began in the fall. The ID badge has a bar code associated with a student’s Social Security number, and the RFID chip monitors pupils’ movements on campus, from when they arrive until when they leave.

Sophomore Andrea Hernandez was notified in November by the Northside Independent School District in San Antonio that she won’t be able to continue attending John Jay High School unless she wears the badge around her neck. The district said the girl, who objects largely on religious grounds, would have to attend another high school that does not employ the RFID tags.

She sued, a judge tentatively halted the suspension, but changed course Tuesday after concluding that the 15-year-old’s right of religion was not breached. That’s because the district eventually agreed to accommodate the girl and allow her to remove the RFID chip while still demanding that she wear the identification like the other students.

“The accommodation offered by the district is not only reasonable it removes plaintiff’s religious objection from legal scrutiny all together,” (.pdf) U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia wrote.

https://www.rutherford.org/publications_resources/tri_in_the_news/texas_schools_win_right_to_track_students_with_creepy_invasive_rfid_locator
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/education/article/Judge-rejects-lawsuit-against-Northside-s-student-4176148.php
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/01/student-rfid-suspension/

Disney World to track kids & families with wireless wristbands.

New wireless-tracking wristbands designed to make the "Most Magical Place on Earth" even more hassle-free will hit Walt Disney World in Orlando, Fla., over the next few months.

The "MagicBands" will be linked to customers' credit-card information and function as room keys and park entry passes, thanks to radio-frequency identification (RFID) chips, which are most commonly used in wireless toll collection and public-transit turnstiles.

The MagicBands are part of a bigger system called "MyMagic+," which also allows the theme park to collect sensitive personal information, including names of guests both young and old, their purchasing and riding patterns and real-time location data.

"Imagine booking guaranteed ride times for your favorite shows and attractions even before setting foot in the park," wrote Tom Staggs, chairman of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, in a blog posting on Monday. "With MyMagic+, guests will be able to do that and more, enabling them to spend more time together and creating an experience that’s better for everyone."

The New York Times reports that, for example, mascot characters could use the information transmitted by the MagicBands to greet visiting children by name — and even wish them happy birthday if so informed.

Such devices will fit right in at Disney World, along with the TSA style checkpoints at rides, the fingerprint readers at the turnstiles, the exhibits on how wonderful GMO agriculture is, and all manner of other disturbing projects implemented at Disney resorts.

But parents could also choose not to share their children's information with park employees in that manner.

The Times said a new part of the official Disney World website, called "My Disney Experience," makes it fairly straightforward to manage MagicBand privacy controls for each member of a family. (There's already a MyDisneyExperience app for iOS and Android devices.)

Parents could share more information about themselves and less about their children, or choose whether to link a credit card to the wristband or simply use it as a ticket to a park or attraction.
http://www.nbcnews.com/travel/travelkit/disney-world-track-visitors-wireless-wristbands-1B7874882