Privacy Orientation during Online Teaching-Learning Activities: Practices Adopted and Lessons Learned

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has shifted from traditional face-to-face teaching to technology-mediated distance learning, creating significant new challenges for teachers and students. The rapid integration of new technologies into the teaching and learning process can give rise to privacy issues. This study investigates how teachers and students of undergraduate and graduate courses in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) have been educated about protecting their privacy during online course activities. An exploratory qualitative-quantitative study was conducted, and 91 participants were interviewed to determine how they were guided to protect their privacy during online course activities. The study found that 75% of teachers consider teaching about privacy in ICT courses to be “very important”. However, these teachers still lack guidance, as 66% have not communicated privacy-related rights to their students. Furthermore, 80% have yet to communicate about websites or the location of privacy information from the educational institution. Despite some positive results identified in the study, such as 93% of teachers reporting that they are recording activities and 91% of students stating that they were informed about the recording of activities, challenges still need to be addressed regarding privacy issues during online teaching and learning activities. Therefore, the study proposes some good privacy practices that can be adopted by educational institutions, teachers, and students in the context of technology-mediated education.