E-Privacy Policy May Tighten

Administrators may soon be required to notify students before requesting the content of their electronic data, the Committee on College Life (CCL) discussed Wednesday.

Under the current electronic privacy policy, administrators may obtain information about the content of student data, including e-mail, as well as the time, date, and size of a message without notifying the student under investigation.

Secretary of the Administrative Board John “Jay” L. Ellison wrote in an e-mail that in the past three years he has never requested the content of a message.

“Any time [administrators] are going to be accessing data there needs to be some kind of check,” said Undergraduate Council (UC) Student Affairs Committee Chair Michael R. Ragalie ’09, who presented the new policy at the meeting.

Ragalie added that students need an avenue for appeal if the College is allowed to request the content of their electronic data.

The committee also discussed requiring student permission before accessing data, a proposal that Ellison said seemed “strange” for a disciplinary proceeding.

“If we have a serious enough case that we need to get this information and can’t get it any other way,” Ellison wrote, “it would be unprecedented to ask permission.”

Before the committee discusses a change in the Handbook for Students, the CCL decided that UC members must collaborate with Ellison to draft a new policy. Ellison will then discuss it with members of the Ad Board and Interim Dean of the College David R. Pilbeam.

—Staff writer Sophie M. Alexander can be reached at salexand@fas.harvard.edu.