New Hanover County Information Technology Department	Issued:  11/01/01
	Policy Number:  5-01
Subject:  NEW HANOVER COUNTY ELECTRONIC MAIL POLICY

Purpose and Scope

The purpose of this policy is to establish acceptable use guidelines for those who use the county-owned e-mail system.  This policy applies to all users of the system and each person that signs on to that system agrees to abide by this policy.  Failure to abide by this policy can result in the county denying its use to the offending staff member.

Change Summary

None.              This is the Original Policy

11/25/2002    Revised to incorporate Confidential Email guidelines.

Policy

Electronic mail (e‑mail) is the preferred method for distributing written communications at New Hanover County.  To assist staff members with the distribution of written communications, the county has installed an e-mail system (Microsoft Exchange) that has become essential to county operation. The Microsoft Exchange system and its contents are County property and are intended to be used for official County business. Incidental personal use of this system may occur, but such usage must not interfere with County business activities. All messages sent or received via E‑Mail are County property and do not belong to either the sender or receiver. Consequently, all E-Mail created on the County E-Mail system (except Confidential or Secure) are subject to Public Access statutes and may be released to the public.  It is against County policy to use E‑Mail for any unlawful activity.

Controlling Authority

The county E-mail system operates under several controlling guidelines of which the user must be mindful.  These guidelines specify the several responsibilities that an e-mail user must meet and they apply to all users of this system.  They are listed below for each user’s review and compliance.

• All New Hanover County Policies and Procedures
• GS 132 - North Carolina Public Records Statute
• GS 121 - North Carolina Records Retention Statute
• Guidelines from the North Carolina Department of Archives and History

Copies of all North Carolina guidelines mentioned above are currently located on the State of North Carolina web site.  Each user should familiarize themselves with the contents of these documents and manage their e-mail in accordance with the requirements contained therein.

The Copywrite Act, the Patent Act or the Uniform Trade Secrets Act may also protect some e-mail content.  Make sure that your use of the e-mail system does not violate any statute.

Confidential E-Mail

The ability to send Confidential E-Mail is a feature of the Microsoft Exchange E-Mail system that enables a user to identify an E-Mail as Confidential so that both the sender and the receiver will be aware of its designation and handle it appropriately.  Confidential E-Mail is not Secure E-Mail!  This means that anyone who receives a Confidential E-Mail can read it even if they are not the intended receiver.  The only way that the E-Mail system treats Confidential E-Mail any differently from open E-Mail, is that Confidential E-Mail is stored separately and is not automatically released under Public Access statutes.  When Confidential E-Mail is being created, sent, and received, it is the responsibility of both the sender and the receiver to handle the E-Mail properly, just as they would for a Confidential paper memo.  To review the categories of Confidential information authorized under the Public Access Statutes, E-Mail users may refer to the Summary of Categories of Confidential Information that has been prepared by the County Attorney.

 

 

Acceptable Use Guidelines

When the County grants an employee an E‑Mail account, that employee is responsible for and agrees to adhere to the contents of this Policy.  Some usage guidelines follow:

• Messages must not be threatening, insulting, obscene, abusive or derogatory.
• Messages must not include remarks that are defamatory toward any person, or constitute sexual harassment.
• Ask yourself:  would I want a jury to read this e-mail?  Would it look good on the front page of the paper?
• Don’t write anything you don’t want repeated.  E-mail can be forwarded to hundreds of people, in and out of this organization.
• Resolve sensitive problems face-to-face, not on e-mail.
• Personal E‑Mail messages must not involve sales or solicitation and must not be associated with any for‑profit business activity.  Some examples of inappropriate personal messages are: sale of personal items, locating homes for animals, religious or political causes and personal real estate needs.
• Messages must not be used to “moonlight”, search for jobs or advertise personal services.
• Messages must not embarrass the addressee, New Hanover County, its officials or any third party.
• Chain letters are illegal and must not be transmitted through E‑Mail.
• INTERNET E‑MAIL IS NOT ALWAYS CONFIDENTIAL OR SECURE.  Make sure you designate your E-Mail appropriately if you need these features.  There are 3 categories of E-Mail that will be implemented in the County E-Mail system:
  • Open (Available now): Email that is open to the Public and will be released upon request.
  • Confidential (Available now within the County system, but not outside the system): Email that is designated Confidential in an obvious manner to remind the sender and recipient to treat it appropriately.
  • Secure (Not yet Available): This is a category of E-Mail that is scrambled so that only the addressees will be able to unscramble it

Be aware that incorrectly designating your E-Mail may be violating the Public Access statutes.

The County E‑Mail system requires extensive network capacity to operate properly. Sending unnecessary E‑Mail, transmitting very large files and sending messages to a large number of recipients should be minimized since that action consumes excessive network resources that are needed for other County business.

Monitoring of E-Mail Messages

New Hanover County does not currently monitor the contents of e-mail messages transmitted on its system but the County does reserve the right and intends to exercise that right to access and disclose contents of E‑Mail messages under certain situations such as but not limited to the following:

• Providing copies of Open E-Mail to the Public as specified under Public Access statutes.
• Finding lost messages
• Searching for and eliminating all viruses attached to or imbedded in incoming messages
• Providing assistance in performing departmental duties when employees are out of the office or otherwise unavailable
• Evaluating the effectiveness of electronic mail
• Complying with an investigation into suspected illegal acts
• Recovering from system failures or other emergencies
• Investigating suspected breaches of security or violation of County policies.
  
  

ExchangeEveryone E‑Mail

You should be aware that email sent to "ExchangeEveryone" is received by approximately 1,000 system users.  This volume of mail messages generates a heavy workload on the computer systems that have to route and store them. Because of this fact, the IT Department has developed an alternative method for distributing these messages that requires less system resources.  It is still imperative that everyone adhere to the following suggestions when using the county e-mail system.

• ExchangeEveryone E‑Mail is reserved for infrequent usage.
• Personal messages are not sent to ExchangeEveryone.
• Large or graphically intensive messages are avoided.

Retention of E‑Mail

New Hanover County has implemented an e-mail archiving procedure.  This procedure will retain copies of all incoming and outgoing e-mail messages in that archive.  The archive will be placed in permanent storage on a weekly basis.  Messages can be retrieved from this archive as outlined in the above paragraph entitled “Monitoring of E-Mail Messages”.  Public requests for OPEN email can also be fulfilled using this archive.

Mailbox Size

In order to conserve disk space on the networks, minimize administrative duties and preserve the integrity of our E‑Mail systems, the county has established some operational guidelines that each user must follow.  These guidelines specify the maximum size of each mailbox.  As the user’s mailbox fills toward that maximum size, the user will receive warning messages to which they must react.  If the user does not remove some of the obsolete messages from the mailbox, incoming messages will have no place to reside and will be lost.  In order to prevent this outcome, each e-mail user must manage their mailbox size. 

Summary

Compliance with this policy is mandatory and failure to comply with its provisions may cause the user to lose the use of the system.  Any violation(s) of this policy may result in disciplinary action as specified in the County's Personnel Manual.

E‑Mail is a strategic business application designed to facilitate and improve communication between employees and other business associations. Please use sound judgment as you use the County's E‑Mail systems.

Change History:

Version	Date	Author	Comments
A	11/1/01	BC	Original Document
B	11/25/02	DB	Revised to incorporate Confidential Email guidelines.