Cyber Security
Suggest Training
Email safety:
- Do NOT send confidential or restricted information (social security numbers, banking info, health records, credit card numbers, etc.) over unencrypted email. There is an encryption feature in Outlook if you are required to email confidential or restricted information. Learn more about the encrypt feature in Outlook.
- After sending encrypted email, the original message is stored in your Outlook "Sent Items" folder and not encrypted. This means that the information in the email message could become compromised if someone other than you gain access to your account. Deleting these messages from your "Sent Items" helps protect the privacy of your recipient.
- To ensure that the message is permanently deleted from your email account, you also need to delete the messages from the "deleted items" folder. This two-step deletion provides you with a means to recover emails just in case you accidentally delete something.
- Ultimately, confidential data should be stored on Winfiles. You can reference the location of a file in an email instead of attaching the file. See the Data Classification Chart.
- Do not send work-related emails from your private email address and vice versa.
Password and Account Best Practices
- Maintain different account names and passwords across platforms and applications.
- Do not use the same password for personal accounts as you do for Linfield-related accounts.
- Try to keep personal account names from matching your login name for public sites like Gmail, NetFlix, and Facebook.
- Use long passwords, utilizing phrases or sentences. The password "SheSellsSeaShellsByTheSeaSh0re" is extremely more difficult to hack than "F%Gih^&40!" and yet easier to remember.
- Never give your password to anybody.
- Always manually log out of anything you logged in to when you are finished.
Read more on creating a secure password https://inside.linfield.edu/its/security/passwords.html
Physical Security
Keep data safe by being aware of your surroundings! If you access confidential or restricted data, you will want to make sure this information is for your eyes only.
- Do not position your screen so it can be viewed by others. This includes having your screen facing a window.
- When devices are not in use, make sure they are stored in a secure location.
- Lock Screens - When you are away from your computer you should manually lock the screen or log out of your account. This is best practice for on-campus and remote work.
- If you setup your phone to access Linfield email or other resources, make sure to lock the screen when you walk away from your device. Do not share your code to access your phone. If you need to share the device, remove access to any Linfield resources.
- Make sure you pay attention to shoulder surfing.
For questions you can contact ITS at 503-883-2553 or macsupport@linfield.edu (McMinnville campus) or pdxsupport@linfield.edu (Portland campus).