HEOA Compliance Plan

Purpose

In accordance with the Higher Education Opportunity Act (HEOA) which was signed into law on 14 August 2008 and which went into effect on 1 July 2010, The University of Alabama’s Office of Information Technology has defined procedures and plans needed to comply with the Information Technology portions of the HEOA.

Scope

This document applies to all users, faculty, staff, students, and visitors, of the University of Alabama networks, wired and wireless.

Requirements

HEOA, in a large part, deals with the means of effectively combating the unauthorized file sharing of copyrighted materials on campus networks, specifying general requirements for all U.S. colleges and universities to include in their written plans:

• An annual disclosure to students describing copyright law and campus policies related to violating copyright law;
• A plan to “effectively combat” copyright abuse on the campus network using “one or more technology-based deterrents;”
• A list of  “alternatives to illegal downloading.”

Annual Disclosure

The University of Alabama’s Office of Information Technology will send an e-mail message to all students, during the fall of each year, to refresh their memories on copyright laws and campus policies, as part of the compliance office’s annual reporting.

Link: Letter to the Students

Technology Deterrents

The University of Alabama has implemented several technology-based deterrents to help combat illegal file sharing (distribution) of copyrighted materials.

1. The University operates and maintains bandwidth packet shapers which can limit the throughput of popular file sharing programs.
2. The University has a registered DMCA agent that receives and actively responds to all DMCA complaints.
3. The University employs intrusion detection and prevention systems to detect and block certain file sharing applications and malware seeking to take control of or steal sensitive information from University owned computers.

Alternatives to Illegal Downloading

As part of the Annual Disclosure in the “Annual Disclosure” section, each student will be sent a link to the Educause list of legal and legitimate sites for content downloading – http://www.educause.edu/legalcontent and http://www.campusdownloading.com.

Revisions

July 2010 – Initial document

August 2010 – 0.8 Inclusion of draft Letter to the Students

August 2010 – 0.9 Inclusion of Copyright Infraction Response Procedure

September 2010 – 1.0 Approval of the HEOA Compliance plan

October 2010 – Publishing of the Plan on the Office of Information Technology’s Web site

Appendix: Process for DMCA Complaints directed to Students