Vice President for Information Technology Status and Activity Report for August 2024 Prepared by Timothy M. Chester, Vice President for Information Technology (VPIT) 1. Key Items for Faculty and Staff Meetings •
Network bandwidth increases to 200 GBps: EITS network technicians recently completed work to increase the internet bandwidth on campus from 40 gigabytes per second (GBps) to 200 GBps. With this increase in bandwidth, students and faculty can quickly access and download educational resources, such as online textbooks, research articles, and instructional videos. The increased bandwidth will help facilitate faster sharing of research data with other institutions and help keep internet speeds efficient, even with many users accessing the campus network.
•
Request for proposal process under way for enterprise survey tool: A search is underway to potentially identify a new enterprise survey research tool for the University of Georgia, which could result in a decommission of Qualtrics by August 1, 2025. A Request for Proposal (RFP) has been posted and current plans are to share an update on the outcome of the RFP process and the name of the next enterprise survey research vendor by mid-fall 2024. As part of this evaluation, all campus units that rely on Qualtrics should review their current and future Qualtrics use. Regardless of the tool chosen through the RFP process, any forms built in Qualtrics that are currently being used for purposes outside of survey research projects will need to transition to other platforms before August 1, 2025. More information on the enterprise survey tool project, including alternative tools, is available on the EITS website: https://eits.uga.edu/about/initiatives/survey_tool/. For more information, contact Stacy Boyles at stacy.boyles@uga.edu.
•
Time-based passcodes in Duo to help combat fraud: To help combat significant increases in payroll fraud and other scams, EITS has changed the process for generating passcodes in Duo, the application behind ArchPass, UGA’s two-step login solution. Passcodes are one of the methods, along with push notifications and a phone call, that can be used to verify your identity when you log in to a UGA application. Passcodes generated in the Duo Mobile App now expire 30 seconds after generation, rather than after they are used to log in. This helps ensure the passcodes are not used by threat actors, who may gain access to a user’s credentials through a phishing attempt. Additionally, passcodes sent through SMS texting expire after five minutes. EITS has also implemented push and email notifications to users whenever a device is enrolled to their DUO account; this helps ensure scammers can’t add devices and use them to access your information or UGA systems. For more information, contact Ben Myers at bmyers@uga.edu.
2. Services for Students •
New personalized mobile-friendly Athena Experience available now: Athena, UGA’s student information system, has been upgraded to a new mobile-friendly experience. The new Athena Experience includes a landing page with an updated look, as well as several new features including tiles tailored to each user based on their role as a student, faculty, or staff member; links within the tiles to Athena features such as class registration, financial aid, student accounts and more; and a landing page that is responsive and easily viewable on a smartphone or tablet. The new Athena Experience is part of an initiative to
VPIT Status and Activity Report for August 2024
Page 1 of 6