Public records show school districts across the US are purchasing phone hacking tools from companies like Cellebrite to search students' personal devices
In May 2016, a student enrolled in a high-school in Shelbyville, Texas, consented to having his phone searched by one of the district's school resource officers.
Gizmodo
Context & Ripple Effects
Cellebrite's extraction tools have been documented moving outward from their original customer base for years: the company worked with US law enforcement across 20 states as far back as 2016, sold New York City police the ability to unlock iOS and high-end Android devices on their own by 2018, and by 2022 had reached 14 of 15 Cabinet departments per purchase records. The new reporting extends that same supply chain into K-12, where public records show school districts buying the tools to search students' personal phones.
The Shelbyville, Texas case — where a student's consented search by a school resource officer opened this line of inquiry — sits alongside earlier coverage of schools adopting Inpixon-style signal-scanning technology to track mobile devices on campus. Together they sketch a pattern: surveillance hardware first, now forensic extraction software, arriving in schools through the same vendor channels built for police work.
First-order effects
School districts join law enforcement agencies as paying Cellebrite customers, meaning students' personal devices can now be unlocked and data-extracted using the same toolset deployed against criminal suspects.
Districts making these purchases create a public paper trail — procurement records — that lets journalists and parents map exactly which schools own phone-hacking capabilities.
Second-order effects
Forensic-extraction vendors gain a new K-12 sales channel beyond government buyers, following the path already taken by school-focused tracking firms like Inpixon, while districts that bought only tracking scanners face pressure over whether extraction tools are next.
Consent-based searches like the Shelbyville one draw scrutiny because minors consenting to a resource officer's phone search raises the same warrant questions already raised by Fog Reveal's warrantless tracking of local police — pushing civil-liberties groups toward litigation or state-level limits on student device searches.
Third-order effects
If the law-enforcement-to-schools pipeline holds, the structural endpoint is a two-tier surveillance economy: one set of tools sold up to federal agencies, another resold down to local institutions like schools, with each expansion normalized by the last.
Sustained procurement-record investigations of the kind behind this story could push legislatures toward disclosure or approval requirements for what surveillance equipment public institutions — including school boards — are allowed to buy.
The trend: Phone-surveillance and hacking tools developed for law enforcement are diffusing down the institutional chain — from federal agencies to local police to school districts — with public procurement records serving as the main accountability check.
NEW from @dmehro and me: school districts in Texas, and the Los Angeles Unified School District, have purchased phone-hacking forensics tech developed by Israeli firm Cellebrite and other firms for use in counterterrorism and intelligence operations https://gizmodo.com/...
Example #47563846575987 of the invasiveness and lack of dignity/humanity with which students are treated. This and all of the rest of the creepy software and technology used to spy in educational institutions is shameful and it was all a very avoidable status quo. https://twitter…
“Gizmodo analyzed a random sample of 5,000 public school or school district websites across the United States and found that eight district websites mention Cellebrite or another MDFT technology.” https://twitter.com/...
Interesting developments in schools on the privacy front. And, the question is begged - in those instances where a student's consent is given before schools access phones, can a minor child even give consent? And, do schools need or just want this tech? https://gizmodo.com/...
Look I understand the his room an extent but nothing that important could be happening. Trying to find students cheating? Do it the normal way. Drugs? Let the police handle it. Bullying? Talk to people. There's 0 reason any school should be hacking students phones.
I remember when the police at my high school would randomly search kids backpacks or lockers. Privacy violations using tech are the subsequent iteration of demanding complete transparency and compliance from children and teenagers. https://twitter.com/...
NEW: @dmehro and @thetomzone found schools in the U.S. are buying phone-hacking tools like Cellebrite, showing how rapidly these invasive tools can spread from the feds all the way down to school administrators https://gizmodo.com/...
@Jioriku My school learned about my shit and started patching quickly. What I did have was access to the entire staff network and all the Macs and a little server and printer access.
@Jioriku I made life hell for my old HS's IT department (then later went in and spent 3 years helping them.) It's not hard. Nobody wants to piss off a techie student.
The tech is from a company called Cellebrite, which is said to have been used to unlock the San Bernardino shooter's iPhone. Now it's being used in schools. https://twitter.com/...
Parents should discuss with their kids why they should never hand over their devices. Also, make sure the devices are secured with a password and not just biometrics. https://twitter.com/...
Can we please stop repeating the lie that Cellebrite was used in the San Bernardino case? I can confirm that it was * not * used to unlock that iPhone. Stop doing free marketing for Cellebrite. https://gizmodo.com/...
And it's all because searches and seizures are easier to carry out in schools - laws protecting teachers and admins and students in fear of disciplinary actions 🤢 https://twitter.com/...
@MaxWinebach Pissing the tech students off is legit kicking a hornets nest and expecting not to be stung. It's never a good idea. Finding openings in networks is something I just find fun and in my last school the accountant and school board secretary had their desktops wide open