From Paul Sawers' "Denmark bans Chromebooks and Google Workspace in schools over data transfer risks" posted Monday on TechCrunch:
Denmark is effectively banning Google’s services in schools, after officials in the municipality of Helsingør were last year ordered to carry out a risk assessment around the processing of personal data by Google.
In a verdict published last week, Denmark’s data protection agency, Datatilsynet, revealed that data processing involving students using Google’s cloud-based Workspace software suite — which includes Gmail, Google Docs, Calendar and Google Drive — “does not meet the requirements” of the European Union’s GDPR data privacy regulations.
Specifically, the authority found that the data processor agreement — or Google’s terms and conditions — seemingly allow for data to be transferred to other countries for the purpose of providing support, even though the data is ordinarily stored in one of Google’s EU data centers.
My take: MacBook Airs are safer, but cost considerably more. As someone who types, I can't recommend iPads for schools. Your mileage may vary.
Now if this drives schools back to much more expensive (total cost of ownership, particularly IT support costs) and vulnerable Windows systems, it will be A Bad Thing.
“Google’s Chromebook laptops, and by extension Google Workspace, are used in schools across Denmark. But Datatilsynet focused specifically on Helsingør for the risk assessment after the municipality reported a “breach of personal data security” back in 2020.”
From everything I read Google does not track children through their school accounts. They are not monetized. They don’t track children under 13 even with a personal Google account. Again, feel free to prove me wrong.
Edit: Google responds, this is only part of the reply…
“Schools own their own data. We only process their data in accordance with our contracts with them. In Workspace for Education, students’ data is never used for advertising or other commercial purposes. Independent organisations have audited our services, and we keep our practices under constant review…”
And yet – this stems from a risk assessment that was carried out “around the processing of personal data by Google”.
Looks like smoke to me….
I avoid both like the plague, Apple’s own office suite is more than enough. Short form video is difficult to be excited about