EMERGENCY ACCESS TO ACCOUNTS AND INFORMATION

UNIS offers electronic services to its computer users to perform work for the School in support of its mission, or for students to learn.

While efforts are made to ensure reasonable expectations of privacy for UNIS computer users, legitimate reasons will arise that require access to information held on UNIS workstations, servers or peripherals. These exceptions may be required based on legal action (such as a court order), may involve the health and/or safety of an individual or group, or be prompted by urgent School business needs.

Should an individual user be unavailable or unable to provide permission to access it, and/or if circumstances supersede the right to privacy, School access without the owner's permission will be provided with the approval of an authorized School official as described in the following procedures.

When business needs require access to employee electronic information – whether stored in a mailbox, network space, on a hard drive, and/or backups of these – and the information owner is unavailable, an authorized School officer (see section 2, item #1 below) should email the Director of Technology who will review the request and authorize the specific access as necessary. If the Director of Technology is not available for any reason, this request should be emailed to the IT team support list (tech.support@unis.org).

Examples of an employee's inability to provide consent include, but are not limited to the following:

• Administrative leave

• An employee leaves unexpectedly and ends up on a prolonged absence

• An employee is suddenly terminated for just cause

• An employee is incapacitated for some reason and emergency access is required

A Principal/Director sends an email request to the Director of Technology with the name of the person who requires access; the name of the employee whose existing information is to be exported, accessed or shared; and specifics as to what information is needed. Outside of dedicated and HR pre-approved business continuation needs, the Director of Technology will seek approval the Executive Director, Chief Academic Officer, and/or Director of Human Resources.

1. The Director of Technology receives the approved request in email, verifies authorization from the appropriate School officer(s), and coordinates request fulfillment with the Assistant Director of Technology.

2. IT team leadership then exports or provides access to the requested information, then works to arrange for a transfer of the information to the requestor. If the request is for email messages, the requestor must specify which mailboxes contain the required information (Inbox, Sent Mailbox, etc.).

3. IT leadership records what was done and keeps notes on the actions indefinitely.

4. IT leadership follows instructions from Authorized officers regarding the preservation and archival of requested data, and will document the request, disclosure details, the name and title of the requestor, and the reason for the emergency request.

In the event materials were discovered impacting the health and safety of a community member, IT leadership will immediately include the Executive Director on further communications.

A Principal/Director sends an email request to the Director of Technology with the name of the person who requires access; the name of the student whose existing information is to be exported, accessed or shared; and specifics as to what information is needed.

1. The Director of Technology receives the approved request in email, verifies authorization from the appropriate School officer(s), and coordinates request fulfillment with the Assistant Director of Technology.

2. IT leadership exports or provides access to the requested information, then works through the Director of Technology to arrange for a transfer of the information to the requestor. If the request is for email messages, the requestor must specify which mailboxes contain the required information (Inbox, Sent Mailbox, etc.).

3. IT leadership records what was done and keeps notes on the actions indefinitely.

4. IT leadership follows instructions from Authorized officers regarding the preservation and archival of requested data, and will document the request, disclosure details, the name and title of the requestor, and the reason for the emergency request.

In the event materials were discovered impacting the health and safety of a community member, IT leadership will immediately include the Executive Director on further communications.

Any request for access to electronic information at UNIS in support of legal actions must be immediately forwarded to the Executive Director. UNIS’s legal representatives will guide any further actions by UNIS employees.

When an faculty/staff is unavailable to receive and respond to email and urgent school needs require continuity of communication, the faculty/staff's supervisor may request that an "Out of Office" message be placed on the employee's email account.

1. The requestor's department head sends the request in email to the Director of Technology, including such details as the name of the email account owner who needs the Out of Office message added to their mailbox, and the text of that message.

2. For terminated employees, it is also important to know how long the Out of Office message should be in place (usually two weeks to 30 days).

3. IT leadership confidentially accesses the mailbox for the sole purpose of creating and enabling the Out of Office message.

4. IT leadership notifies the original requestor, schedules the removal of the Out of Office message, and then closes the ticket.

• Source: The Emergency Access to Accounts and Information, Brown University