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March 09 2011
Watch Where You Put That Thing: Wiretapped Teddy Brings $120K Fine
Tap that teddy bear and pay the price: $120,000. Or at least, that’s what Dianna Divingnzzo and her father, Sam Divingnzzo, are due to pay out after being slapped with federal wiretapping charges.
The fines arose from a custody case over Divingnzzo’s daughter with ex-husband William “Duke” Lewton. After Lewton was awarded unsupervised visitation, Divingnzzo put a recorder inside her daughter’s teddy bear (cutely, if not creatively, named “Little Bear”) to document suspected physical and verbal abuse by Lewton. The recorder taped continuously, while Divingnzzo occasionally copied the files and sent them to her father for transcription.
The Little Bear plan got hairy when Divingnzzo tried to use the material to win back sole custody, explains Ars Technica:
All of this material was then turned over to Dianna’s lawyers, who submitted it to the state court and waited for a ruling on its legality. In the summer of 2008, the state judge decided that the recordings were not admissible as evidence in the custody trial, since they violated the Nebraska Telecommunications Consumer Privacy Protection Act and were therefore obtained illegally.
This also meant ...
October 27 2010
Kid Spyware Brings Helicopter Parenting to a Whole New Level
For those hyper parents who must know exactly what their kindergartner is doing at every moment–including how she’s interacting with her peers, and how that will ultimately affect her chances of being accepted to an Ivy League school–here’s a nifty bit of technology. Researchers in Japan are testing out a device for kids to wear that gives parents the ability to see everything that passes before their kid’s eyes.
The technology builds on existing devices that can track the location of a child, but this gadget also monitors what the child is seeing, and even their pulse. If a child’s heart rate is faster than usual, it snaps a photo of their point-of-view and alerts parents via email…. A password-protected website allows parents to access an activity log and photos taken during the day.
Seung-Hee Lee of the University of Tsukuba, who led the team that built the device, says it could help parents find out about bullying or could be used to track down a missing child, but we can think of lots of other handy uses. Parents can find out if their kid’s eyes waver from the blackboard, and punish them accordingly. They can find out who their kid has a raging crush on by keeping a close watch on that heart rate.
The gadget is currently being tested on 10 children aged 2 to 6, and further trials are planned for slightly older school children. The device’s makers also hope to add a microphone and software that will store the child’s conversations. As for privacy concerns, Lee scoffs at them. She’s a mother, she told New Scientist, and she’d choose safety over privacy for her child any day.
Related Content:
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80beats: School Spying Case: School Accused of Taking Thousands of Webcam Photos
80beats: Lesbian Parents & Their Well-Adjusted Kids: What the Study Really Means
80beats: Generation iPod: Young’Uns Spend 53 Hours a Week Consuming Media
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