Fight for the Future and 18 human rights, civil liberties, and youth advocacy organizations have published a letter calling on school administrators to ban eproctoring apps like Proctorio, ProctorU, and Proctortrack.
The letter details serious concerns about eproctoring, including its “invasive data collection, risk for academic harm, inefficacy at preventing academic dishonesty, and the potential to perpetuate racism and ableism.”
Signatories are calling for a complete ban on eproctoring technology in both university and K-12 settings.
Software that uses AI-powered systems to monitor students as they take tests, often through required webcam recordings and facial recognition technology, is known as eproctoring.
Many online proctoring programs record students and their rooms through webcams.
The letter states that “eproctoring programs are invasive, dangerous, and fail to prevent academic dishonesty. They demonstrate systemic bias against non-white students, are harmful for students with testing anxiety, and discriminate against students with disabilities. They also treat students as if they are guilty until proven innocent, which is a disrespectful and harmful stance for any academic institution to take.”
“Eproctoring is an invasive, unaccountable, and discriminatory practice that has no place in an educational environment built on mutual trust and respect. Educators should reject eproctoring and rethink the way students are evaluated in many courses to avoid the use of these toxic surveillance tools,” said John Davisson, Senior Counsel, Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC).