NZ edtech pledges not to spy on pupils

WELLINGTON: New Zealandowned educational technology companies are pledging not to spy on schoolchildren.

Edtech surveillance by multinational tech companies to harvest pupils’ personal data is provoking controversy, clampdowns and court cases in the US and Europe.

The NZ Tech Alliance said it was unclear whether these practices were occurring in New Zealand.

However, schools without much money were being forced to rely on free software from major offshore providers with questionable data collection practices, the alliance said.

Critics said the quid pro quo was the providers got to harvest pupil data, to sell on to data brokers for advertising, but also to use the AI to assess and guide student learning in an opaque way.

‘‘If the product is free, then you’re the product,’’ said the alliance’s Dave Moskovitz, a council member of the subgroup EdTechNZ.

Local products and services tended to not be free, he said.

The government’s stance still favoured big global tech, but local firms could use the incoming pledge to set themselves apart, Mr Moskovitz said.

‘‘What it enables local software providers to do, is say, ‘We care about privacy, and these are the ways in which we care about privacy, and this is how we’re going to steward this important taonga of your students’.

‘‘Try to get something like that out of one of the overseas platforms — you won’t.’’

The pledge, which has been out in draft form, will be an undertaking not to share pupils’ data with third parties or use it to advertise to students.

The Education Ministry’s two big edtech contracts are with Microsoft and Google — both said they protect pupil data but have been subject to clampdowns and court cases overseas.

Mr Moskovitz said the ministry was very slowly showing signs of beginning to listen to local edtech.

‘‘The ministry will claim . . . that they don’t want to favour anyone, but in fact . . . they do favour the large platforms because they have these allencompassing large contracts with them.’’

It would be an improvement when Microsoft and AWS set up data centres in New Zealand, so student data was not stored offshore, but this form of ‘‘data residency’’ was no substitute for real ‘‘data sovereignty’’ where full control was retained here, he said.