[Mezzie]

Oh, it's insane and I recoiled when she mentioned that.

But it is 100% happening.

People do amazingly stupid things with systems, especially when they don't have enough people with the expertise to set them up properly, so they just throw things in there without stopping to think about whether or not it's a good idea.

[SoftTalker]

So, a particular school system decided to add SSN to the student profile? Or Canvas requires it?

[saghm]

I'm guessing that Canvas just sort of lets you put in whatever data you want, and someone evidently decided that putting the student's SSNs in there made sense...

[Mezzie]

It's not required. I don't know precisely what her district is doing or why - I don't work there But she unprompted brought up that a lot of the minors' PII was in there including SSNs.

[SoftTalker]

It would be nice if system owners stopped thinking "we'll just ask for all the info in case we need it" and instead "we might get sued (or ransomed, or both) because we are collecting this."