Privacy Digest

Digital prints draw critics / Tribune-Chronicle: "WARREN -- A high-tech pilot program at Warren G. Harding High School involving digital images of the students' fingerprints has raised a few eyebrows among parents.

Although several parents have voiced concerns, school officials say the program would not violate the students privacy rights.

The biometric scanning identification program, which is expected to officially start Monday at Harding, is ''an effort to provide students with a safe and easy way to identify the student and match to his/her account when using the cafeteria,'' according to a letter sent to parents last week.

Under the new system, parents will be able to put lunch money on the student's account, and fingerprints will act similar to a debit card. Officials say it also will lessen embarrassment from students on the free and reduced lunch program. Jackson Milton School District has a similar program in place.

By using a finger scanner, the software scans the students fingerprint image to create and store individual templates of unique points that identify each student. When the student returns, the software again scans the finger and looks for a numbered match in the database.

''Although the computer software scans the finger image for personal identification, it does not store a copy of the fingerprint. Instead, the computer program creates a template of the unique fingerprint characteristics. This insures the privacy of the student,'' the letter states.

Many Harding students had their finger images scanned Tuesday for a trial run to make sure there were no glitches in the system, City Schools Communications Director Dawn Marzano said.

''The letters were sent out on Friday and unfortunately, there was not a date stated in the letter as to when the finger imaging was going to start, so I think when some of the parents heard that some of the kids were being imaged today (Tuesday), they weren't aware that it was just a test for the software,'' Marzano said.

The letter does include an opt-out portion for parents and students to sign if they do not want to participate in the program, but Gil Rucker, a local attorney and parent of three Warren students, said parents should be given more time to discuss the finger imaging with their children."

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