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UNC School of Medicine Laptop Encryption Initiative

In response to a University wide audit of computing systems at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Chancellor has assigned the Vice Chancellor for IT at UNC-CH the responsibility of ensuring the Campus IT systems are adequately protected.  The vice chancellor of IT has published an Information Security Policy.  This policy addresses the inherent problems with mobile devices.  Mobile devices are often lost or stolen, putting the user, University and private individuals at risk.  To help mitigate this risk, the School of Medicine Information Security Team is facilitating the implementation of the  Information Security Policy within the School of Medicine. The Laptop Encryption Initiative seeks to inventory and encrypt all laptops used for University business within the UNC School of Medicine. The first priority is to encrypt all laptops that have sensitive information by July 1^st 2012

Please read the SOM Laptop FAQ for more information. If you have questions please go to http://help.med.unc.edu/ to submit a question.

Securing the School of Medicine Network

The School of Medicine is working hard to make your network more secure. Beginning in February 2012 OIS will be implementing Network Access Controls (NAC) which will perform a series to checks to see if devices connecting to the SOM network meet minimum security requirements. These controls will prevent devices with vulnerabilities connecting to network, providing an added layer of protection to your computer and data from malware. Look out for emails, flyers in your building and updates to http://help.med.unc.edu/nac website for more information including a schedule as to when NAC will be implemented in your building.

Managing Technology More Effectively and Efficiently

OIS is undertaking two initiatives to improve the way we respond to your technology related issues.

The first initiative is to change the way we provide IT support to School of Medicine customers. We are focused on:

• Keeping you informed about the status of your help request
• Improving the timeliness of the initial response to your request
• Making sure you are routed to a person or resource that can answer your resolve issue on first contact
• Improving the turnaround time for resolving your issue

Beginning this month we will start to implement some of the changes we have been working on. The first change will be to our help site at http://help.med.unc.edu. You will be able to contact OIS Client Services directly for help with your technology related issues by either submitting a web form or by starting a chat session. 

The second initiative involves using technology to more effectively and efficiently manage computers. OIS is currently running a pilot to test Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager. This tool will allow OIS and other IT personnel within in the School of Medicine to manage desktop computers by seeing which computers have out of date software, operating systems, security patches etc. and allowing the staff that support these devices to update this machines quickly without having to go to each individual machine. OIS expects testing to be completed by end of March 2012.

We will keep you posted on updates on both these initiatives through the Vital Signs newsletter and on this website.