SAT Test Demanding Teen Information Prompts Regulator Query

This is very interesting information. I did not know that these testing companies were considered to be nonprofit. Thus they can sell student's information to colleges. I am not sure why this is not illegal. I think we should keep our eyes on this one.

U.S. Representatives Ed Markey and Joe Barton asked the College Board, owner of the SAT college entrance exam, to explain how it collects and stores data from students as the government seeks to bolster teen privacy laws.

Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, and Barton, a Republican from Texas, requested the same information from College Board competitor ACT Inc., including disclosure and privacy policies, in letters to the nonprofit organizations today. Copies of the letters were posted on Markey’s website.

Both companies collect data from millions of teenagers annually as they register for SAT and ACT tests and then sell their names and personal information to colleges, which use them in direct marketing to potential applicants. While Markey and Barton introduced a bill this month to expand a children’s online privacy law to teenagers, the proposal doesn’t cover nonprofit companies, such as the College Board and ACT.

“There should be some kind of regulatory control over what even a nonprofit can be culling from students,” said Pam Dixon, executive director of the World Privacy Forum, a nonprofit public interest research group in Cardiff by the Sea, California.

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