Introduction

As an academic institution, Purchase College recognizes that it is absolutely
critical that faculty, staff, and other college employees have confidence that
their privacy will be respected and protected when they are using college
computing resources.

This policy describes the Purchase College privacy practices regarding
information collected by faculty, staff, or other college employees, including
temporary appointees, on college-owned workstations and servers.

This policy covers the college email accounts that are assigned to employees
(faculty and staff), personal “home directories” that are created for individual faculty and staff members, and the contents of college-owned desktop and laptop computers that may be assigned to individual employees.

This policy specifically does not cover information stored in departmental file shares on a server—even if that departmental file share contains a subfolder that may be in the individual’s name. Departmental file shares are specifically set up to be used to store shared documents, and unit supervisors have access to all materials stored in a departmental file share.

Supervisors should note that departmental file shares are the preferred
storage method for official college-related business. Employees should be
strongly discouraged from storing official college-related business (memos,
reports, policies, spreadsheets, or official correspondence) in any place other than a departmental file share.

College Email, Personal Home Directories, and Desktop or Laptop Disk Drives

The entire contents of each individuals email account, personal home directory, and desktop or laptop disk drive(s) are considered private.

No other college employees will access or view the contents of these for any
reason without specific written approval from a minimum of two of the
following:
• President
• Vice president or equivalent college officer (CFO, COO)
• SUNY legal counsel
• Chief of University Police

Specific written approval should be in the form of a completed Security
Investigation Clearance Form (Security Investigation Clearance Form.doc). In emergency circumstances, specific written authorization may be provided via email, but is still required as stated above.

Supervisors seeking access to departed employee materials must obtain
approval as noted above—the individual’s right to privacy does not expire on
their last workday.

Contact Information
For questions regarding this Internet privacy policy, please contact:
Contact Bill Junor Via email
Via regular mail:
Bill Junor
Director of Campus Technology Services
Purchase College
735 Anderson Hill Road
Purchase, NY 10577