Problems with the story in that link:
1. activating a laptop webcam puts the light on - it's why the video of the daughters has them looking directly at the camera, they are wondering why the light is on.
2. the sleep mode stuff probably comes from the wake on lan (or wowlan for wireless) confusion - where you can wake a computer up with a magic packet. If it isn't activated in bios it isn't going to work, you also have the 'trying to get through the firewall in the router' issue.
3. The installation vector seems to be a dodgy link and/or flash video. So it also assumes no antivirus software detection.
4. As people are usually assigned a non-static IP address on the internet then the dodgy software would have to connect to the viewer to establish comms. Once again a bit difficult if in sleep mode.
It seems to be a sensationalist version of what the US school was caught doing - where they issued students with laptops already fitted with spying software, disabling any indication of the cam being activated etc.
School settles laptop spying case to “protect taxpayers” | Ars Technica