Working securely: Raise awareness and share information
Over the last year, the University’s responsibilities for managing information and data security have become more demanding and we are responding with a robust programme of changes. This will have an impact on the ways we normally work and becoming compliant is a focus for us all.
We must also be aware that criminal and malicious cyber-activity is increasing in both scale and sophistication. Our values of openness and freedom may make us wary of the rules and controls needed to protect ourselves and our institution from attack, among others, the National Cyber Security Centre has noted a particular rise in cyber-crime exploiting the coronavirus pandemic.
What should I be doing?
Read and share security information
One of the most important things you can do is to check insite regularly for posts on Security and Information Management. We’ll continue to provide important messages over the next six months (and beyond), so reading and sharing this content will help increase awareness and understanding of the important changes the University is making.
We’ve posted a series of articles on insite about security and information management, including advice on keeping your device secure. If you’ve been reading these, you’ll know that working away from campus increases our vulnerability, just as some of the measures we’re taking to safeguard our people and information get more complicated. There are lots of things you can do to help, and we’ve summarised these in the section below.
In summary
Use an IT Services-managed device if you can
Working from home, use a University-owned and managed device if you can. If you can’t, there is lots of advice available online. If you have to use a self-managed computer or a personal device, check IT Services advice on working from home, or contact the IT Services Helpdesk.
Connect to the campus VPN
If you are using an IT Services managed computer (laptop or desktop), please connect to the VPN every week to get critical security updates and to sync your files. Here is a guide to how to use campus VPN. If you don’t regularly connect every week, after a while your device will no longer be recognised by the network and you'll need to contact the Help Desk to resolve the issue.
Secure your devices and data
Keep anything with professional or personal data on it secure at all times - things like laptops, tablets, phones. Personal and University data can be easily lost or compromised by old-fashioned physical theft. Secured devices, locked screens and encrypted drives reduce the risk of anything being lost or stolen. Again, for more advice, contact the IT Services Helpdesk.
Keep your work securely backed up
Office 365 (OneDrive, Sharepoint, Teams), your Warwick shared drive or H: Drive are all suitable places to back up your files. When these drives are backed-up, remember to also keep the backups secure. An insecure backup of information is a one-stop shop for attackers and sometimes far easier to get to than the main systems themselves.
Communicate securely
If you need to share data with colleagues, please use the secure messaging within Office 365 and Teams or online document sharing system. If you have to share data by email outside the University, consider password protecting documents and sharing the password via text.
Moving forward
In the future, all devices connecting to our network will need to meet minimum security specifications to access University data – the work to achieve this change is scheduled to develop over the next 6 to 9 months. Any device that doesn’t meet the minimum security specifications after this time will be unable to access several University systems. Support and help will be available to enable users to configure their devices to regain access. It is therefore very important that you do not ignore emails or other communications about this change as work progresses.
Communication to students
We're also ensuring our student community is kept up to date.
Please share the new Stay Safe Hub on My Warwick with all student-facing teams.
Message from Professor Stuart Croft, Vice-Chancellor and President
“Members of the University Executive Board collectively underline the importance of the Information Security Change Programme. We need to take greater care of our data - this is truer now than ever. The University-wide change programme will help us to work more securely for the benefit of teaching and learning, our intellectual property, research and management.
This Programme and the work that flows from it needs understanding, commitment and action from everyone at Warwick. There will be guidance and help available, with training and support and expert assistance, but we must all adopt the new standards of security without exception, working together to secure our future.”
Expert comment from Warwick's Cyber Security Centre
“Cyber attackers put far more effort than might be expected into penetrating systems. These targeted attacks are harder to spot within the ever-present background noise of opportunistic and untargeted malicious activity. The majority of the low-level, mass attacks, together with harm caused by well-intentioned but misguided people (who misconfigure software or do other things, not out of mischief but by mistake), can be countered by good cyber hygiene. That is what we must promote.”