In an attempt to open during the pandemic, many US universities are forcing students to download location-tracking apps, sometimes as a condition of enrollment
what we don't hear nearly enough—how terrible university surveillance regimes are for students and the university community. https://www.theatlantic.com/ ... @theatlantic : Some colleges are trying to prevent COVID-19 outbreaks by surveilling their students. But trying to do so is all but useless, @zeynep writes: https://on.theatln.tc/bIVycCF Leah / @leahswanky : “Hiding from authorities because they have come up with an unworkable plan during a pandemic—opening university dorms but expecting students not to socialize—will foster cynicism, not education.” https://twitter.com/... Annie Jacobsen / @anniejacobsen : “Mandatory COVID-19 apps could result in an even worse outcome than that of tracking athletes—” The Pandemic Is No Excuse for Colleges to Surveil Students - The Atlantic https://www.theatlantic.com/ ...
The AtlanticZeynep Tufekci
Context & Ripple Effects
The pandemic didn't invent campus surveillance — it industrialized it. Before COVID, schools like Syracuse University were already tracking students' phones to monitor class attendance, with critics warning the practice would desensitize students to round-the-clock monitoring. When universities decided to reopen dorms in fall 2020, that existing apparatus became the enforcement layer: location-tracking apps imposed as a condition of enrollment itself.
The Atlantic's argument, carried by @zeynep, is that these regimes are both harmful and all but useless — dorms were opened while students were expected not to socialize, so the tracking punishes behavior the institutions themselves made inevitable. Later reporting bore out the efficacy gap: colleges deploying [[a:963729|symptom-checking apps, temperature stations, and wearables had never rigorously studied whether any of it worked]].
First-order effects
Students face a take-it-or-leave-it choice — download the tracking app or forfeit enrollment and campus housing — making consent meaningless at exactly the moment campuses reopened.
As Leah's quoted reaction suggests, students respond by hiding from authorities rather than complying, since the plan asks them to live in dorms while pretending isolation is possible.
Second-order effects
Vendors of screening tech gain a captive institutional market: universities buy apps, wearables, and check stations under reopening pressure without demanding evidence they work, as the NYT later documented.
The cynicism effect compounds — each unworkable mandate teaches students that compliance systems exist to protect the institution's reopening decision, eroding trust that public-health messaging depends on.
Third-order effects
Emergency-era tools are proving sticky: by late 2023, one California college was running an everyday stack of homework trackers, e-proctoring software, and license plate readers — the pattern suggesting pandemic surveillance becomes permanent infrastructure rather than a temporary measure.
If the pattern holds, higher education consolidates around a surveillance-first operating model where student data collection is the default and opting out is treated as noncompliance — extending the trajectory Education Week flagged when schools adopted social-media monitoring with little regard for privacy.
The trend: Campus surveillance is ratcheting upward through successive justifications — attendance, safety, then pandemic control — with each crisis normalizing tools that outlive the emergency that introduced them.
Some colleges are trying to prevent COVID-19 outbreaks by surveilling their students. But trying to do so is all but useless, @zeynep writes: https://on.theatln.tc/vvBkYfk
Sister Prof Zeynep, I see you are questioning the coherence of bringing 18yo to college and then punishing them for being 18yo at college. Your scrutiny is not helpful & gives succor to heretics. Remember, mitigation was not created for man; man was created for mitigation. https:…
I know whose responsibility it is not: the 18-year-olds brought together to a place where socializing *is* one of the (latent) functions of the institution. https://www.theatlantic.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
ah yes, let's bring fresh high school grads who've been fed unrealistic expectations of ~the college experience~ to campus, charge them the same tuition, make it incredibly easy for them to socialize indoors, and expect them to NOT act according to their nature. very responsible!…
.@zeynep has had more •early• important articles on the pandemic about what we are doing wrong than just about anyone. https://www.theatlantic.com/ ...
Brilliant piece by @zeynep about some universities' desperate efforts to control COVID19. What a wasted opportunity; university campuses are full of smart people who all want to contribute to a solution. Community health requires community engagement https://www.theatlantic.com/ …
Sad but not just a bad reflection on colleges; it's part of a broader story of people in power way over-estimating the efficacy of contact tracing apps, something I wrote about w @e_setzer and @chas_gk back in July https://www.lawfareblog.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
Everything @zeynep writes is so smart, and here she clearly explains something glaringly obvious and frustratingly overlooked, and that underscores why I find all the blame-those-partying-students stories infuriating. https://www.theatlantic.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
This article by @zeynep is brilliant. We need to be talking more about the manifest and latent functions of a university, and what it means to open up campus while shift blame to students as they expect some of the most crucial parts of university life. https://www.theatlantic.co…
Great, thoughtful article from @zeynep, making a strong case that attempts to surveil students are wrong and futile. Excerpt here captures why it's hard to envision safe, successful return to on-campus experience right now, even with aggressive testing. https://www.theatlantic.co…
Those COVID apps some colleges are trying to force students to download? Worse than useless. You know what else is worse than useless? Bringing the students together for a few weeks, and then sending them home in a panic, to seed new clusters. New piece. https://www.theatlantic.c…
“If digital contact tracing is to be invoked, it has to be through voluntary apps with strong guarantees of privacy and a lack of punitive consequences.” - @Zeynep Tufekci cautions against mandatory COVID apps on college campuses in @TheAtlantic https://www.theatlantic.com/ ...
Sage words on the (ir)responsibilities of opening university campuses during an uncontrolled pandemic and—what we don't hear nearly enough—how terrible university surveillance regimes are for students and the university community. https://www.theatlantic.com/ ...
Some colleges are trying to prevent COVID-19 outbreaks by surveilling their students. But trying to do so is all but useless, @zeynep writes: https://on.theatln.tc/bIVycCF
“Hiding from authorities because they have come up with an unworkable plan during a pandemic—opening university dorms but expecting students not to socialize—will foster cynicism, not education.” https://twitter.com/...
“Mandatory COVID-19 apps could result in an even worse outcome than that of tracking athletes—” The Pandemic Is No Excuse for Colleges to Surveil Students - The Atlantic https://www.theatlantic.com/ ...