Technology Usage Policy

In support of its educational mission, EICC owns and maintains a number of information technology resources. EICC has a responsibility to protect the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of those resources while ensuring compliance with federal, state, and local laws and regulations. The purpose of the EICC Technology Acceptable Use Policy is to communicate the individual responsibilities of those accessing EICC information technology resources.

Scope

This policy applies to all individuals granted access privileges to any EICC information technology resource, including employees, students, vendors, auxiliary organizations, consultants, contractors, and external organizations that use college information technology resources. This policy applies to all use of EICC technology resources, whether those resources are accessed from on-campus or remotely. All members of the College community share the responsibility for protecting information resources for which they have access or custodianship.

EICC information technology resources include all wired and wireless computing, networking, telephony, data, and information resources, including third-party providers’ systems that access or store EICC protected information. By sharing and using these resources, users accept full responsibility for their actions and agree that they will use these resources in an ethical manner. Individuals are also subject to compliance with federal, state, and local laws governing interactions that occur on or through the use of EICC information technology resources.

Responsible Use

As an academic community, the faculty, students, and staff of EICC honor intellectual property, respect the privacy of data, and respect the rights of others. People who use both on-campus and external EICC resources (including any communication performed on the network for any purpose) must do so responsibly, in a manner that constitutes respectful behavior as laid out in the employee and student handbooks. If someone requests you stop communicating electronically with them, you are obligated to do so.

Those accessing social networking services such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and others should carefully read the terms and conditions set forth by such services. Users are solely responsible for the content of their accounts.

Those using personally owned computers and mobile devices to access college technology resources, including wired, wireless, or remote connections, are responsible for ensuring that their devices are fully updated and protected against viruses, malware, and other threats.

Anything less than adherence to the letter and spirit of copyright laws and regulations is unethical and possibly illegal. Users must abide by license agreements controlling copying and use of software and data.

Users are granted access to EICC technology resources based on their roles and responsibilities. Each user is responsible for safeguarding their account credentials and passwords used for accessing technology resources. Individual passwords should not be printed, stored online (except in a secure password manager) or given to others. Accounts and passwords used to access EICC technology resources must not be shared with anyone including family members, friends, and other members of the EICC community.

Personal Use

College resources are provided solely for the education, training, and research mission of EICC and may not be used for commercial or for-profit purposes, without express written permission. Users who express opinions and positions through the College’s IT resources must make clear that these opinions and positions are those of the individual who posts them, not of the College. College resources should not be used for personal activities not related to appropriate College functions, except in a purely incidental manner. Employees should consult their supervisor or manager to determine reasonableness of personal use. The college and the EICC Information Technology Department have no responsibility to secure, protect, or backup any data stored or transmitted for personal purposes using college resources.

Prohibited Use

No form of discrimination or harassment will be tolerated.

EICC technology resources may not be used to violate or attempt to circumvent federal, state, and local laws and regulations. EICC technology resources may not be used to access TikTok, in accordance with the Iowa Governor’s directive https://governor.iowa.gov/press-release/2022-12-13/gov-reynolds-issues-directive-ban-access-tiktok-state- iowa-devices.

Each information technology resource - those existing on campus as well as external ones to which we are connected - has an owner. Attempts, even unsuccessful ones, to use, access, or copy any resource without the permission of the owner is a violation of this policy.

Users may not deliberately perform acts that waste technology resources or unfairly monopolize resources to the exclusion of others.

Users may not install or use encryption software on any college technology without first obtaining written permission from the IT Department.

Users must not install software, hardware, or modify system configuration settings on any college technology asset, unless explicitly permitted by the user’s role and responsibility.

Use of Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI)

The college supports responsible use of generative AI tools, but there are important considerations to keep in mind when using these tools, including information security, data privacy, compliance, copyright, and academic integrity. Information shared with generative AI tools is not private and could expose proprietary or sensitive information to unauthorized parties. Under no circumstances should confidential or sensitive data be entered into publicly available generative AI tools. Students should consult the student handbook and faculty instructions for appropriate use of AI tools for academic purposes, while employees should consult their supervisor or manager and the employee handbook to determine appropriate use. All policies regarding responsible and prohibited uses of technology apply to the use of generative AI tools.

Expectations of Privacy

As a carrier of information, EICC does not subject users’ files to constant review. However, all information transmitted or stored using college technology resources is considered college property and may be accessed at any time in the regular course of college business. Individuals should have no expectation of privacy in anything they create, store, send, or receive when accessing college technology resources.

Exceptions

Any exceptions to this policy must be approved, in advance, by the IT Department and, in the case of employee exceptions, by the employee’s supervisor.