How To Know If Your Laptop Camera Is Spying On You?
Top of mind–right after quality of educational tools–is security. Here’s a great article from Ask a Tech Teacher contributor, Melissa White. She is a technology writer and security specialist at TechCommuters. With extensive experience in digital safety, data protection, and threat intelligence, she creates insightful content that helps readers navigate the evolving technology landscape. Melissa focuses on online privacy, secure computing practices, emerging risks, and practical solutions for businesses and individuals.
This is longish, but worth the read–in a sentence:
Is your laptop camera spying on you? Learn the warning signs, how to check for spyware, and simple steps to protect your privacy right now.
How To Know If Your Laptop Camera Is Spying On You?
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Is your laptop spying on you?[/caption]
Your laptop camera may look harmless. It sits quietly above your screen. Most people barely notice it. But in some cases, it can become a privacy risk.
Hackers and harmful software can sometimes access your webcam without permission. Certain apps may also use the camera in the background. The worst part is that you may not notice anything unusual while it happens.
This type of attack is often called camfecting. It happens when someone remotely takes control of your webcam. They may watch you, capture photos, or record videos without your knowledge. In some situations, the camera light may not even turn on. Security experts continue to find many devices affected by these attacks every year.
The good part is that there are warning signs you can look for. There are also simple ways to secure your laptop and block unwanted access. In this guide, you will learn how to spot suspicious webcam activity and what steps to take if something feels wrong. (more…)
What’s Trending on Ask a Tech Teacher
I calculate what’s trending on my blog by which of my posts are popular in a particular time period. Here’s the run-down so far this year:
- 33 Great Research Websites for Kids
- K-12 Digital Tools
- How to Find Old Elementary School Teachers
- 100th Day of School — It’s about Learning
- Start Here (to use AATT)
- 17 Websites on Natural Disasters
- 14 Websites to Teach Mouse Skills
- How Students Can Build Their Own Apps
- Robot Teachers vs Human Teachers
- Want to Write for Us?
More top posts
Click here; scroll down the sidebar to “Top Posts”:
Tech Tips to End the School Year
Wrapping up your school technology for the summer is as complicated as setting it up in September. There are endless backups, shares, cleanings, changed settings, and vacation messages that — if not done right — can mean big problems when you return from summer vacation. If you have a school device, a lot of the shutdown steps will be done by the IT folks as they backup, clean, reformat, and maybe re-image your device. If you have a personal device assigned by the school but yours to take home, the steps may be more numerous but really, not more complicated.
Here’s a list. Skip those that don’t apply to you and complete the rest. I won’t take time in this article for a how-to on each activity so if you don’t know how to complete one, check with your IT folks or DDG (Duck Duck Go) or Google it:
What You Might Have Missed in May–What’s up in June
Most-read posts last month:
- May Is #Homeschool Awareness Month
- How do I grade technology in my school?
- National Personal Finance Challenge
- 5 Favorite Activities to End the School Year
- Successful USNA Graduates
- National Spelling Bee Coming In May
- Looking for Summer Activities? Try These
- Simple Ways Teachers Can Integrate AI Ethically in the Classroom
Here’s a preview of what’s coming up: (more…)
Best Online Korean Teacher Platforms for Speaking, Grammar, and TOPIK Practice
As you head into summer, the Ask a Tech Teacher team will post a variety of internationally-themed articles for those looking beyond English-speaking borders. Here’s one on learning and teaching Korean:
Best Online Korean Teacher Platforms for Speaking, Grammar, and TOPIK Practice
Most people assume any Korean tutor will do the job. But the best online Korean teacher platforms are built around something more specific: structured progression, native-speaker interaction, and real accountability. After reviewing dozens of options across lesson formats, pricing models, and learner responses, the gap between a frustrating experience and genuine fluency often comes down to platform fit. This guide covers the top five platforms worth your time, whether you’re chasing conversational skills, grammar depth, or a serious TOPIK score.
The shortlist methodology
Options were evaluated by pulling publicly available data from user reviews, official websites, language-learning directories, and feature breakdowns on trusted review platforms. Only platforms with a documented track record in language education made the cut.
→ See the full research breakdown (more…)
World Environment Day: Living Responsibly with Nature
World Environment Day, celebrated annually on June 5th, is designed for encouraging awareness and action for the protection of our environment. Established in 1972 by the United Nations General Assembly and first held in 1974, it has grown with participation from over 143 countries.
Significance
World Environment Day serves as a reminder of our collective responsibility to protect and preserve the environment. It encourages individuals, communities, and governments to take concrete actions towards sustainable development and to address critical environmental challenges like climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution.
Activities and Impact
Mark the day with various activities such as:
- Educational events: Workshops, seminars, and discussions on environmental issues
- Clean-up campaigns: Community efforts to clean up litter and pollution in local areas
- Tree planting: Reforestation and afforestation efforts to combat deforestation
- Art and cultural activities: Exhibitions, concerts, and performances that promote environmental awareness
(more…)
Subscriber Special: Discount on School Licenses
Every month, subscribers to our newsletter get a free/discounted resource to help their tech teaching.
May 28th-June 6th:
Buy any K-8 Tech Curriculum School License
20% discount (digital only)
To take advantage of this special, purchase from Structured Learning with PayPal. If you use a PO, email admin@structuredlearning.net with the discount applied to the PO (during the sale).
What is a school license?
Benefits of a School License
- provide an overarching curriculum map for using technology in your school
- provide access to full text PDF from every digital device in your school, 24 hours a day. This maximizes productivity and student independence.
- enable flexible learning paths as students work at their own pace, with the ability to review or work ahead as needed
- share tech-in-ed pedagogy to infuse your school with technology
- enable teachers to vertically integrate with core grade-level teachers
- provide multiple authentic and organic formative and summative assessments
- provide free online Help via Ask a Tech Teacher (staffed by educators who use SL resources).
Benefits of School License for Students
- provide easy access to monthly lessons, how-tos, rubrics, project samples, practice quizzes, grade-level expectations, homework, images, and checklists (grade level Scope and Sequence and the Ready to Move On monthly keyboard workbooks lists, for example)
- provide full color instructions that can be zoomed in on for greater detail
- allow a convenient place to take lesson notes (using a PDF annotator)
- encourage students to be independent in their learning, work at their own pace. This is great both for students who need more time and those who ‘get it’ and want to move on
- enable a quick way to spiral up for quick learners or back to earlier resources for student needing to scaffold their learning
- prepare students for the rigor of end-of-year summative testing
NOTICE: We will be on summer schedule through August. That means 3-4 posts a week instead of 4-5.
A Teacher’s Guide to Managing Creative Projects Without Burnout
For those already thinking about next year, Ask a Tech Teacher contributor, Jenny Wise, has ideas on managing class projects without burning out. This time of year, we all feel on the edge. Jenny has great ideas to prepare for summer school classes if you teach them, or the new school year. She has navigated the complexities of raising a growing family, supporting her children through life’s difficulties, and finding strength through faith, resilience, and connection.
If you’re interesting in homeschool ideas, Jenny shares family homeschooling experiences, practical advice, encouragement, and resources for parents considering or navigating homeschooling through her platform, Special Home Educator. Her mission is to support and inspire other families by honestly sharing the ups and downs of creating a personalized education at home.
A Teacher’s Guide to Managing Creative Projects Without Burnout
For busy classroom teachers who also lead clubs, performances, showcases, or other creative work, the real strain isn’t the project itself, it’s the extra layer of coordination piled onto an already full day. Teacher workload challenges grow fast when student team coordination, shifting expectations, and last-minute questions keep spilling into planning periods and evenings. That pressure can make managing extracurricular projects feel like a personal endurance test instead of a normal part of the job. The good news is that stress management for teachers often starts with educational project planning that makes responsibilities, communication, and follow-through predictable. (more…)
June is Internet Safety Month
June is National Internet Safety Month, thanks to a resolution passed in 2005 by the U.S. Senate. The goal is to raise awareness about online safety for all, with a special focus on kids ranging from tots to teens.
Here’s a short list of internet cautions I got from online efriends. I reprint it every year because it covers all the basics, avoids boring details, and gives kids (and adults) rules to live by:
Not everything you read online is true
It used to be anything we read in print was true. We could trust newspapers, magazines and books as reliable sources of information. It’s not the same with the web. Since anyone can become published, some of the stuff you’re reading online isn’t true. Even worse, some people are just rewriting stuff they read from other people online, so you might be reading the same false information over and over again. Even Wikipedia isn’t necessarily a reliable source. If you’re researching something online, consider the source. Some poorly written, random web page, isn’t necessarily a good source. However, if you find a .gov or .org site, the information has a better chance of being true. Always look at who owns the website and whether or not they have an agenda before considering whether or not certain information is true.
Looking for Summer Activities? Try These
Earlier, we posted books you might like to read this summer. Now, we’ll focus on what to accomplish with your summer. Here are popular AATT articles. Pick the ones that suit you:
