FBI probes school district over webcam-spying claims

A Pennsylvania school district accused of spying on students by remotely activating webcams on district-issued laptop computers is being investigated by the FBI, according to an Associated Press report.

Federal investigators want to know, specifically, if officials with the school district broke any federal wiretapping or computer-intrusion laws, an unnamed source told the AP.

District officials revealed more details about the actions, which led to a lawsuit filed by a student and his parents. The officials acknowledged that they remotely activated laptop webcams 42 times in the past 42 months — but only to locate missing computers, and never to spy on students.

For more on this story, see FBI joins Pennsylvania webcam school spying investigation on ZDNet.com.