Legal Implications of Online Assessment: Issues for Test and Assessment Owners

Abstract

At a time when information, including purloined test and assessment content, moves at “Internet speed,” test and assessment owners are usually comforted to know that the law provides meaningful protection if threshold test security measures are observed. This chapter explores the question of whether that protection extends to the use of online assessment which promise greater access, convenience and savings. Applying threshold security requirements derived from copyright and trade secret laws, this analysis indicates that in its widely practiced and current form, online assessment would fail to qualify for protections by which disclosure of text content could be swiftly condemned. Online test and assessment owners are cautioned to explore threshold security alternatives and to carefully weigh the importance of their tests, as well as investments in the creation and distribution of a test instrument, against the potential loss of test content.