Zooming in on Privacy and Copyright Issues in Remote Teaching

In the time of COVID-19, remote teaching (RT) is no longer simply an option: it is the core of a longer-term blended learning strategy. As a response to the pandemic, the European Commission is calling for a ‘truly inclusive and high-quality digital education in Europe’ (Digital Education Action Plan). This project responds to this call by contributing to a more privacy-friendly, creativity-fostering, and ultimately safer RT provision. Against this backdrop, the aim of this project is to explore how RT providers (e.g. Zoom and Moodle) handle teachers’ and students’ data and learning materials in order to provide guidance to higher education institutions (HEI) and teachers on how to ensure a safe online transition. Our previous research suggests that, buries in the RT platforms’ opaque terms of service and privacy policies, there are provisions that allow RT providers to dispossess teachers and students of their data and learning materials (Ducato et al. 2020). Such unsafe RT environments adversely affect the student experience. The project is part of a broader ongoing study led by the applicants. Since March 2020, the applicants have been scrutinising RT tools and services that HEI and teachers have often adopted without proper scrutiny due to the urgency to respond to COVID-related limitations to in-person interactions. Building on this, the key objectives of the project “Zooming in on Privacy and Copyright Issues in Remote Teaching” are (1) to provide an in-depth understanding of the main privacy and copyright issues in RT; and (2) to identify best practices, compliance hurdles, and recommendations for privacy-enhancing and creativity-incentivising RT. This project will adopt a comparative and socio-legal methodology. First, to reflect the expertise of the applicants, the focus will be on EU-derived laws in the UK, Italy, and The Netherlands. Second, a survey will be circulated to understand the privacy and copyright issues that teachers are encountering in practice.