IT Security Awareness training is required annually for every employee and emeritus faculty member with an active account at the University of Memphis. Your training for this academic year is now available: https://www.memphis.edu/its/security/security-awareness.php

Please complete your training by Oct. 31. Note this is a change from previous years in which training extended into February. Training for all current faculty, staff and emeritus account holders must be completed by the end of October 2024.

If you have completed previous training by the due date within 12 months, this course takes approximately 15 minutes to complete, and you have the option to test out after a brief intro. Otherwise, the training is approximately 30 minutes.

NEW REQUIREMENTS THIS YEAR:
In addition to the standard IT Security Awareness training, you will see two additional items that must be completed by Oct. 31:

• ‎IT Security Policies and Guidelines acknowledgement: Click the “Start” button, which will open the ITS Policies and Guidelines webpage. You will need to return to KnowBe4 and click the “I acknowledge” box to affirm that you have received the policies, which apply to all UofM technology users.

• Data Privacy: Due to new requirements, we have added a brief data privacy training module, titled “What is Sensitive Information in the U.S.?” This course lasts approximately 5 minutes.

As with previous annual training, anyone who has not completed all training items by the due date will have their UofM account restricted until training is completed.

Access IT Security Awareness Training: https://www.memphis.edu/its/security/security-awareness.php

After you complete all training items, you will receive a confirmation email within one hour.

If you have any issues accessing the training, contact the ITS Service Desk at 901.678.8888 or umtech@memphis.edu.

Thank you for partnering with us to secure UofM digital resources, protect your account, and safeguard employee and student information!

Students, Faculty, and Staff,

In March 2020, ITS promptly implemented and introduced the widely recognized collaboration software Zoom to address the urgent need for a virtual meeting platform for academics and administration. Over time, Microsoft has made substantial investments in advancing their online collaboration platform, Microsoft Teams. Following a thorough examination of budgets and feature comparisons between the two platforms, we will capitalize on our longstanding partnership with Microsoft and adopt the collaboration tool integrated into our software agreement, Microsoft Teams. Effective August 12, 2024, we will discontinue the use of Zoom. We are confident that Microsoft Teams has reached a sufficient level of evolution to serve as our primary collaboration and virtual meeting platform.

Key Details:

1. Transition Timeframe | All virtual meetings and collaborative efforts will be conducted through Microsoft Teams effective August 12, 2024.
2. Training | To ensure a seamless transition, we will be offering training sessions on effective Microsoft Teams usage. Session details are available on the UM3D training site, where you can also schedule your training.
3. Support Resources | Documentation and resources to help you become familiar with Microsoft Teams can be found on the Microsoft Teams website. For questions, you can contact the ITS Service Desk via email at umtech@memphis.edu or call 901.678.8888. You may also ask your local LSP any questions you may have.
4. Feedback | Your feedback is important to us. If you have suggestions or concerns during this transition, please share those with us by submitting them to the ITS Suggestion Box.

We recognize that embracing change can present challenges, yet we are confident that Microsoft Teams will deliver the collaboration features required and enhance our overall communication experience.

Ascending,
Karen Bell
Interim CIO
Information Technology Services

Dear Campus Community,

Information Technology Services (ITS) is updating our internal processes related to password resets. The new process provides you with self-service features to reset your passwords more quickly using existing technologies that help automate the process. Additional benefits for the University include increased efficiency of our ITS Service Desk and strengthening of our information security program. Effective July 31, ITS Service Desk staff will transition to supporting the new process and will no longer have the capability to assign “temporary” passwords. For more information about this self-service feature please, see the New Password Reset Process webpage.

You must have a personal email address in Banner to use your personal email address to reset your password. Your personal email can be accessed in the Personal Information section of the myMemphis portal. For students, the Personal Information section is located on the My Resources page under the Student Pages menu. For faculty and staff, the Personal Information section is available on the Employee page.

Thank you for understanding and for your support of our information security program.

If you need assistance with this or any other technology needs, contact the ITS Service Desk at umtech@memphis.edu or 901.678.8888.

Regards,

Robert Jackson, EdD, Chief Information Officer

Dear Campus Community,

ITS recommends manually restarting or shutting down your computer and other devices at least once per week.

Software and hardware vendors are constantly identifying security vulnerabilities within their products and the pace at which vendors release security updates has increased. In response to the changing security landscape, ITS (Information Technology Services) is quickening our cadence for software updates and security patches.

Regularly checking for new browser versions and other app updates — and enabling automatic updates where available — is an important first step to ensuring system security. Rebooting your system often is equally necessary to protect your digital assets.

ITS recommends manually restarting or shutting down your computer and other devices at least once per week. Rebooting in this way allows updates to software, hardware and peripherals to complete their installation and be applied to your system. While Windows or macOS updates might include a restart reminder, other pending updates could be awaiting a reboot without such notice. Shutting down your computer also resets the system, often resolving slowdowns or other performance issues.

For more information about rebooting your device and other best practices, visit the IT Security Policies and Guidelines page on our website. If you need assistance with this or any other technology need, contact the ITS Service Desk at umtech@memphis.edu or 901.678.8888.

Regards,
Robert Jackson, EdD
Chief Information Officer

Dear Colleagues,

The telephone system upgrade to RingCentral is underway and on schedule. RingCentral is deployed for all ITS phone extensions, Physical Plant phone extensions and the ITS Service Desk call center. The Administration Building is scheduled for migration this month.

During the transition, 4-digit dialing for campus extensions will be affected. When dialing within the phone systems, 4-digit dialing is available and works as expected. This includes RingCentral extension to RingCentral extension or Avaya PBX extension to Avaya PBX extension. Dialing 4 digits between separate phone systems is not available.

• If your phone extension has been migrated to RingCentral, dialing the full 10-digit number (901.678.8888) is required to reach a campus phone extension that is on the Avaya PBX system. 
• If your phone is still on the Avaya PBX system, 9 plus the 7-digit number is required to reach a campus phone extension that is on the RingCentral unified communication system.

Please check the RingCentral website for the most current information about the project, including the building schedule on the Timeline page. Remember that building dates are tentative and subject to change. Contact ringcentral@memphis.edu for questions related to the project.

If you need assistance with RingCentral, please contact the ITS Service Desk at 901.678.8888 or umtech@memphis.edu.

Best regards,

Karen Bell

Associate CIO
Information Technology Services

Skype for Business is reaching the end of life on July 31st, 2021. After this period, this application will no longer work. Microsoft Teams is the official replacement product. The same functionality and abilities available in Skype for Business are available in Teams. For documentation on how to utilize this product follow this link How to use Microsoft Teams.

For assistance with this transition or general questions about Teams, please contact the ITS Service Desk online, by email, or by phone at 901.678.8888. Your Local Support Provider is also available for on-hand assistance.

BlueJeans has been our primary conference tool for faculty and staff since November 2015. While BlueJeans has served the University community well, it fell short in providing a cost-effective method that would include access for our 20K students.

What’s next?
To meet the need, we’ve adopted other conference and collaboration software tools like Zoom, Virtual Classroom/ Assignment, and Microsoft Teams.

What do I need to do?
If you have any recordings located on BlueJeans you will have to (1) move download these recordings and upload them to other supported services (OneDrive or Ensemble Video) or (2) delete the recordings from your account by July 30, 2021. (Note: If you don’t delete your recordings by July 30, 2021, the files will no longer be available to access. )

Where’s the documentation?
We have created a website for information about how to download or delete recordings from BlueJeans.

For assistance with BlueJeans, please contact the ITS Service Desk online, by email, or by phone at 901.678.8888.

Information Technology Services (ITS) previously notified the campus about a security incident. ITS is continuing to work with security forensics experts to identify and remediate compromised systems. Service levels are continuing to improve. As part of our remediation efforts and out of an abundance of caution, the following actions will be taken for all Universal User ID (UUID) passwords:

The minimum password length will be increased to 15 characters effective March 10.
All passwords must be changed March 10-31 using the iAM website. This includes all students, faculty and staff. For more information about changing your password see our How to Change Your Password page.

Your UUID and password are used for single sign-on to access many University IT resources. Individuals will receive reminders through March 31 to change their passwords.

That’s correct. Microsoft Teams is available to all faculty, staff and students. Microsoft Teams is the hub for group collaboration in Microsoft 365 that integrates people, content, and applications. Teams brings simplicity to teamwork by joining collaboration, sharing, and communication all under one platform.

Microsoft Teams incorporates several applications into one. Here are a few functions offered: the chat function allows instant messaging between groups and individuals. Add GIFs, stickers or emojis to inject some personality into your conversation. Calls allow you to make audio and video calls over the network to students and colleagues. Channels are the conversations you have with your teammates. Each channel is dedicated to a specific topic or project and can be found within Teams. Files are documents that can be downloaded, edited, and shared with teammates. Files also offer quick access to your OneDrive storage. The activity feed is a summary of everything that has happened in the channels that are on your teams list. Apps provide you with seamless integration with Microsoft applications in your team workspace. Calendar integrates with your Outlook calendar to make time management more efficient than ever. Think about the tools, files, and dashboards that would be helpful to your group collaborations. Many of them can be added right into Teams.

Microsoft Teams is a chat-based collaboration platform complete with document sharing, online meetings, and many more features for group communications. Having a team space is key to being able to make creative decisions and communicate effectively with one another.

Introductory training for Teams can be found in LinkedIn Learning, Microsoft, and Learning Curve. More detailed information about Microsoft Teams can be found on our website.