What is the Equifax data breach?

On September 7, 2017, Equifax CEO Rick Smith announced that on July 29, 2017 Equifax suffered a data breach between May and July 2017. The breach may have included the personal credit information of 143 million Americans, including social security numbers, birthdates, addresses, driver’s license numbers and credit account information. As a point of comparison, there are only about 126 million households in America.

What does this mean for me?

If a malicious actor were to get your personal information, they could sell it, or use it to impersonate you. They could open credit accounts in your name, and use them for illegal means. This could lead to lowering your credit score, or having charges pressed against you for non-payment. It is a serious breach, but we are all in this together.

What can I do to protect myself?

• Consider a credit monitoring/protection service – Equifax has a website, www.equifaxsecurity2017.com, where you can check to see if your record is impacted. After you enter your last name and last 6 digits of your social security number (SSN) it will tell you whether your personal information was part of the breach. Afterward, it will give you the opportunity to enroll in TrustedID Premier*. Based on the number of enrollments, they will give you an enrollment date. On your enrollment date, you will have to return to the link they gave you and continue through the enrollment process. Once enrolled, Equifax will monitor your credit and alert you if there is a problem. *NOTICE:  The arbitration clause and class action waiver included in the TrustedID Premier Terms of Use applies to the free credit file monitoring and identity theft protection products, and not the cybersecurity incident.
• Setup your personal account on SSA.gov – The stolen information from this breach could potentially be used to open an account with the SSA and perpetrate tax fraud. We recommend creating an SSA account as a preemptive measure.
• Consider freezing your credit accounts – A freeze tells the four major credit agencies that your credit report should not be shared and a new line of credit should not be opened when requested. You can unfreeze your account with a PIN if you want to take out a loan in the future. In order to freeze your credit, you must notify each of the major credit bureaus. Brian Krebs, a renowned information security professional has a great post that covers this topic in detail.
  • Equifax Security Freeze
  • Experian Security Freeze
  • Innovis Security Freeze
  • TransUnion Security Freeze
• Check your credit report annually – The Ohio Attorney General website has more information.

What if I have more questions?

In addition to information provided on www.equifaxsecurity2017.com, Equifax also has a toll free number setup, 1-866-447-7559, although some callers are reporting a fast busy signal due to high call volume.

Check out these new features from Dialpad:

• Audio settings and system test – Not sure if you have your headset or microphone setup correctly? The system test will you check all aspects of your setup.
• Run Dialpad from within your Chrome Browser – Using a different computer or a shared workspace? Now you can access Dialpad by just using your browser.
• Do not disturb mode now displays a banner across your app screen so you don’t forget to turn it off.
• There are new guides available from Dialpad, including tutorial videos on things like making a three-way call, setting your caller ID, and recording your voicemail greeting.

Update 1:30pm

Google has notified us that the problem has been corrected.

Update 10:50am

Google has posted this update on their status board.  “We’re investigating reports of an issue with Google Drive. We will provide more information shortly.  Google Drive is not loading files and results in a 500 error.”

Original message:

Some users are experiencing Google Drive issues.  They are getting the message “The server encountered an error. Please try again later.”  Updates will be added here as we learn more about the issue.

Until August 27th, to see your NoteBowl courses you will need to click on “COURSES >>” in the left navigation bar of NoteBowl. A window will appear to the right showing all your NoteBowl courses grouped by semester. On Sunday August 27th, all Fall 2017 courses will be considered “active” courses by NoteBowl and will appear in the left panel under the “COURSES >>” heading – you will only need to click the “COURSES >>” link to access courses that are not Fall 2017 courses.

FOR STUDENTS: courses will only appear in your NoteBowl course listing if your professor has chosen to use NoteBowl and made the course available. If you do not see a course listed there, please check in with your professor to see if the course should be available to you.

If you have any questions, please contact the ITS Help Desk at 740-587-6395 or helpdesk@denison.edu.

Office 2016 for Windows and for Mac is available at no charge to current students, faculty, and staff through Denison’s Microsoft Office 365 instance and may be installed on up to 5 Windows or Mac computers. For information on how to download it, please log in to MyDenison and go to My Apps -> Software Downloads…  -> Microsoft Office.

Hoonuit (formerly Atomic Learning) provides courses on the individual Office 2016 applications (Word 2016, Excel 2016, PowerPoint 2016). To locate these, log in to MyDenison and go to My Apps -> Hoonuit and click the “Search” tab.

If you have any questions, please contact the ITS Help Desk at 740-587-6395 or helpdesk@denison.edu.