Subject:

Important Information re: Computer Security

Recent cyber attacks in the news are striking closer to home. These developments are unfortunate and require continuing diligence by everyone in our institution. Both our campus IT security team and Health Sciences IT security team have been working collaboratively to secure our IT environment. I have requested that they be assertive to further improve our IT security throughout UC San Diego.

At the same time, I need to engage each of you for immediate action to assist in further securing the IT assets and data that you use at UC San Diego. This is mandatory and requires your immediate action as follows:

Any UC San Diego owned desktop or laptop computer that you use for UC San Diego business must have Sophos antivirus program or an equivalent anti-virus program installed on it immediately. Additionally, any UC San Diego owned laptop computer that you using for UC San Diego business must have Sophos full disk encryption program or an equivalent disk encryption program installed on it immediately.

To verify if your computer already has Sophos antivirus program installed, for Windows computers, at the right bottom corner of your screen, you will see a small blue S icon on the tool bar. For Mac computers, at the top right corner of your screen, you will see a small blue S scion on the tool bar. If you are not certain, please speak with your IT support staff.

For information to obtain Sophos antivirus and full disk encryption software, please visit:

http://blink.ucsd.edu/technology/security/network/standards/resources.html

If you use your personal computer to access UC San Diego information, your personal computer must have an antivirus program installed and updated regularly.

Individuals or departments who independently manage their own servers and other computing devices are required to immediately update security patches on their servers and other computing devices.

If an application will not operate with up-to-date critical security patches, you are required to contact our IT security team at security@ucsd.edu.

Per UC San Diego policy, unpatched computers will be at-risk for removal from the UC San Diego network.

While our IT security teams have been diligent about securing our IT systems, we must continue to act together and cooperatively to further protect our computers and data from these external threats. Please take action now.

Thank you, Pradeep Khosla Chancellor