Protect IU

Indiana University recently sharpened one of its tools used to provide a safe and secure experience for students, employees, and visitors — its Protect IU website. Faced with a security challenge with the original website, officials decided to redesign Protect IU and, in the process, made it mobile-first and a convenient way to get questions answered and to report concerns.

From the start, Protect IU has combined everything safety-related into one website. At IU, this includes the operations within the Public Safety and Institutional Assurance¹ (PSIA) framework: Public Safety (and the IU Police Department), Emergency Management and Continuity, Environmental Health and Safety, Enterprise Risk Management, the University Information Privacy Office, and Physical Security and Access.

The site originally used Drupal for web content management. After a security patch in late 2014, a decision was made to switch to IU's enterprise web content management system, which uses Hannon Hill's Cascade Server. This change provided the opportunity to re-envision how information for the various security and safety functions would be presented to the more than 100,000 students who attend the university on campuses across the state.

In the spirit of the Homeland Security safety mantra, "If you see something, say something," the Protect IU homepage has a "Report a concern" button that provides students, employees, and visitors a range of contact information to report various concerns or to get help. Contacts include police, emergency management, crisis and suicide hotlines, sexual violence resources, safe-ride services, and others.

Directly beneath the "Report a concern" button is the "Report an IT incident" button. Information privacy and security experts wanted to make it as easy as possible for students and staff to report such issues as phishing, e-mail abuse or misuse, HIPPA violations, and other data protection concerns.

The new Protect IU launched on August 18, 2015, just before the start of the new school year at IU. Through events and social media, PSIA staff have been encouraging students and employees to bookmark or save the website's URL to their cellphone home screens. It's not an app, but the mobile-first platform has increased usability so much that the website is nearly as easy to use on a cellphone as it is on a laptop or desktop computer. When the website is opened from a cellphone, the two buttons for reporting a concern appear without the need to scroll.

One challenge to the redesign and also to the effectiveness of the website has been the sheer size of IU, which saw more than 100,000 students begin classes at the seven campuses administered by the university. More than 40,000 people work at IU, too.

PSIA staff worked to make content useful for all of the campuses. If someone selects the "Report a concern" button, for example, they can receive local emergency contact information whether they attend IU Southeast in New Albany or IU Northwest in Gary 260 miles to the north.

Two important links appear at the bottom of the homepage. The "Emergencies" link takes viewers to the website, where emergency notifications and other critical information are posted during emergency situations on any of the campuses.

The "Annual Security Reports" link takes viewers to a web page that discusses the federally required Annual Security Reports and Annual Fire Safety Reports and provides links to the reports for each campus.

Protect IU is one of many steps the university takes to keep its students, employees, and visitors safe. Efforts continue to increase awareness and use of the site and to make sure it meets the needs of its audiences.

Note

1. PSIA falls within both the Office of the Executive Vice President for University Academic Affairs and the Office of the Vice President for IT and CIO at Indiana University.

Tracy James is assurance communication manager for Public Safety and Institutional Assurance at Indiana University. Before joining PSIA almost a year ago, she worked for nearly 11 years on the IU Bloomington News and Media team, and, before that, as a daily newspaper reporter in Southern Illinois.