Student Accounts Privacy

This site is owned by the Granite State College and operated by the MIS Department at the University of New Hampshire. Your privacy on the Internet is of the utmost importance to us. Granite State College does not sell or otherwise provide any information collected on Student Information System Web sites to any external entity except as expressly stated on this site, or as otherwise required by law. The Privacy Statement below applies to the WebROCK Web site, your WebROCK Web account, and any information you provide on this site. Please be sure to check other sites for their privacy policies.

1. Introduction

The primary purpose of the WebROCK Web site is for Granite State College related activities only. In order to operate the Web service and to reduce the risk of fraud, Granite State College must ask you to provide us information about yourself. This Privacy Statement describes the information we collect and how we use that information. Granite State College respects the privacy of your personally identifiable information. This information may include name, address, social security number, and will be used only in accordance with the terms of this Privacy Statement. We will not sell or rent your personally identifiable information. However, as described in more detail in Section 3 below, there are limited circumstances in which some of your information will be shared with third parties, under strict restrictions, so it is important for you to review this Privacy Policy. This Privacy Statement applies to all services offered on WebROCK sites.

By using this site, you signify that you understand how your privacy is protected and how your personal information will be used. We reserve the right, at our sole discretion, to change, modify, add, or remove portions of this statement at any time. Your continued use of the Granite State College WebROCK site following the posting of any changes signifies that you are comfortable with changes to the privacy statement and have accepted those changes. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact us as described in Section 6 below.

2. Information We Collect

Network Information

Information collected automatically is analyzed to help us understand how you use our Web services and how we can improve our site to better meet your needs. Like most other Web sites, the following information is collected automatically:

• IP Address
• Type of browser and operating system used to access our site
• Date and time the user accessed our site
• Information regarding which pages users access or visit

Email Information

If you send us an electronic mail message with a question or comment that contains personally identifying information, we will only use the personally identifiable information to respond to your request and analyze trends. We may redirect your message to another government agency or person who is in a better position to answer your question. If you provide us with your e-mail address we may send you notices of new events, products, and services. You will be given the option to unsubscribe from any mailing lists to which you are added.

Required Information

To access WebROCK, you must provide your Student ID number and Personal Identification Number (PIN). In order to make payments you will be transferred to the QuikPAY Web site where you must provide credit card and/or your bank account information. Credit card and bank information will not be collected or stored in the Granite State College Student Information System data base. This information is necessary for us to process transactions, to issue a new PIN if you forget or lose your PIN, to protect you against credit card fraud, and to contact you should the need arise in administering your account. You may set up an authorized payer account on the QuikPAY site which will permit other individuals that you designate to see your billing statements and make payments on your behalf. Information on authorized payers will not be stored in the Granite State College Student Information System data base.

Transactional Information

When you use WebROCK for transactions such as registering for classes, making a payment to Granite State College, we ask you to provide information related to each transaction such as the amount of the payment, the courses you wish to register for, or information needed for determining admission status. Information provided by the user is the data needed to successfully complete a Web transaction. We retain this information for each of your transactions through WebROCK in the student data base.

Our Use of "Cookies"

"Cookies" are small files of data that we send to your computer to allow us to recognize you as an WebROCK customer. We send a "session cookie" to your computer if and when you log in to your WebROCK account by entering your Student ID and PIN. These cookies allow us to recognize you if you visit multiple pages in our site during the same session, so that you don't need to re-enter your PIN multiple times. Once you log out or close your browser, these session cookies expire and no longer have any effect. Our cookie files are encoded so that your information can only be interpreted by Granite State College.

3. Our Use and Disclosure of Information

Internal Uses
We use the information we collect about you in order 1) to provide our services and process your transactions and 2) to provide customer service. Specifically, we use your information to help you complete a transaction, to communicate back to you, to update you on service and benefits, and to personalize our Web sites for you.

We give access to personally identifiable information about our users only to those Granite State College employees who need to know that information in order to provide products or services to you.

Disclosure to Other WebROCK Users
Non-employee WebROCK users can only view their own information based on the individual Student ID and PIN they enter to login. Employee WebROCK customers can view information needed in order to provide services to you (i.e., class rosters, phone numbers, admission application information). Disclosure to Third Parties
Granite State College will not sell, rent, or lease your personally identifiable information to others. Granite State College will not share any of your personally identifiable information with third parties except in the limited circumstances described below, or with your express permission (and to employees as described above), or to comply with applicable law. These third parties are limited by law or by contract from using the information for secondary purposes beyond the purposes for which the information is shared.

1. We share information with organizations that help us process the transactions you request and protect our customers' transactions from fraud, such as sharing your credit card number with a service that screens for lost and stolen card numbers.
2. We disclose the information we collect, as described in Section B above, to organizations that perform services on our behalf or to other financial institutions with whom we have joint service agreements (For example, the National Student Clearinghouse acts as our agent to verify enrollment information for student loan recipients and to process requests from third parties for verification of attendance and degrees.) These organizations are subject to confidentiality agreements with us and other legal restrictions that prohibit using the information except to provide the specified related services, unless you have affirmatively agreed or given your prior permission for other uses.
3. We disclose information that we in good faith believe is appropriate to cooperate in investigations of fraud or other illegal activity, or to conduct investigations of violations of our Acceptable Use Policy.
4. We disclose information in response to a subpoena, warrant, court order, levy, attachment, order of a court-appointed receiver or other comparable legal process, including subpoenas from private parties in a civil action.
5. We disclose information to your agent or legal representative (such as the holder of a power of attorney that you grant, or a guardian appointed for you)
6. We share aggregated statistical data with our business partners or for public relations. For example, we may disclose that a specific percentage of our students are New Hampshire residents. However, this aggregated information is not tied to personally identifiable information.
7. We share information with third parties, in compliance with the Federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA).

Internet Address Information
We use IP addresses, browser types, and access times to analyze trends, administer the site, improve site performance, gather broad demographic information for aggregate use, and to conduct investigations on fraud, illegal activity, and other violations of our Acceptable Use Policy.

4. Information Security

Granite State College is committed to handling your information with high standards of information security and in compliance with the USNH Information Technology Security Policy. While no computing environment is 100% secure, we take every precaution to protect the user's information. When a user submits sensitive information via the Web, that information is protected both online and off-line.

Your credit card information is stored only in encrypted form on computers that are not open to the Internet. We restrict access to your personally identifiable information to employees who need to know that information in order to provide products or services to you. If you are transacting business with us over the Internet, the security of your information is protected by:

1. Participating in the VeriSignTM program, which certifies all of our secure servers;
2. Using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption technology to transmit confidential information between your browser and our Web servers; and
3. Keeping our databases and our Web servers separate, and protecting each with an electronic and physical firewall.

Tips for Safe Transactions

1. Use an SSL-capable browser such as MS Internet Explorer 5.0 (or higher) or Netscape Navigator 4.7 (or higher ) with 128-bit encryption (40-bit encryption secures your information, but 128-bit provides more security).
2. Don't walk away from your computer when in communication with our servers.
3. Safeguard your PIN and other identifying numbers and do not share them with others.
4. Keep personal information such as your mother's maiden name and identifying numbers (including your Social Security, driver's license, passport, and credit card numbers) in a safe and secure place. Do NOT share this information unless you know the purpose for which it will be used.
5. Before anyone else uses your computer, clear your cache or restart your browser (this eliminates copies of Web pages that have been stored in your hard drive). The preference menu in your browser can tell you how to clear your cache.
6. Always use the Exit function when ending your WebROCK session, especially if you plan to leave your browser open.

5. Links to Other Web Sites

Our Web site contains links to other sites. Please be aware that Granite State College is not responsible for the privacy practices of such other sites. The user is encouraged to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy statements of each and every Web site that collects personally identifiable information. This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by Granite State College via WebROCK. Other Granite State College Web sites, as well as non-Granite State College Web sites, may have their own privacy statement which should be reviewed.

6. Contacting Us

If you have questions about our Web site or concerns regarding privacy, you may contact:

Granite State College Registrar
8 Old Suncook Road
Concord, NH 03301

Granite State College
University System of New Hampshire
WebROCK Privacy Statement
Published April 11, 2005