The parents informed school officials, who launched an investigation. Randolph Superintendent John Battles said students secretly installed a program, called a keystroke recorder, into their teacher's computer. The program, which was downloaded from the Internet, created a computer file that recorded the teacher's password as he logged on. Hal Gumbert, the author of a keystroke recorder program, said the Randolph incident was not the first in which the program has been used inappropriately. Fla. Gumbert said the program is designed to record everything that was written before a crash or screen freeze.
Some people forget to save their files while they're working.
Some parents also will use the program to monitor their children's activities on the Internet, especially when it comes to chat rooms, he said. In the Randolph case, the program allowed the students to take their teacher's password off the file. They then logged on as the teacher, found a copy of the exam, made copies and offered them for sale, the superintendent said. Randolph police Detective John Fichter, who is handling the criminal aspects of the case, said charges are pending against four of the students involved. Under state law, the removal of the exam would be a disorderly-persons offense.