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6 Internal and External E-mail

6.1 Etiquette

E-mail is a useful tool, but like many tools, it can be abused.

The following tips are intended as helpful guidelines rather than rigid rules, but should be followed when sending any e-mails, whether purely internal (i.e. to a xxx@lamp.ac.uk address) or external.

6.1.1 General

Don't keep mail longer than necessary, especially with large attachments.
Do include a brief signature on your e-mail messages to help the recipient understand who it is from.
Don't use an over-elaborate signature on your e-mail message. Never, ever, use scanned images in a signature as these tend to be very large.
Don't send excessive multiple postings to people who have no interest. This is known as "spamming" and is considered to be ignorant.
Don't forward chain letters or "make money fast" messages. There are several hoaxes about to do with viruses - never pass these on without checking with UCS first.
Don't mark things as urgent if they aren't, because then when you really do have an urgent message it may not be treated in the way it deserves.
Do not reply to SPAM, ever. It tells the sender that the address they sent that particular message to is ‘live’, and you will then start to receive even more SPAM. Clicking on any ‘Remove me from your lists’ links does exactly the same thing. The best thing to do with SPAM is to delete it unread.

6.1.2 Writing Style

Do try to think about the message content before you send it out.
Do be polite. Terseness can be misinterpreted.
Do try to use humour and irony sparingly. You can use smileys such as :) or :( to indicate facial expressions, but make sure that the recipient understands what they mean.
Do try to quote from the original message where relevant. You can break the quoted message down into paragraphs and comment on them individually to make it clearer.
Do use emphasis where it’s useful to do so. A common convention is to use a *star* either side of the word you want to stress.
Don't type in CAPITALS as this is considered to be SHOUTING. This is one of the rudest things you can do in e-mail.
Don't over-use punctuation such as exclamation marks ("!") as these are meant to be for emphasis. In particular avoid more than one exclamation mark ("!!"), especially if your e-mail is quite formal. Also, over-use of the full-stop (e.g. "....") can make a message difficult to read.
Don't criticise people's spelling, it is considered petty. Many people have no way of running a spell check on their messages and we all make typos.

6.2.3 Composing or Replying to e-mails

Make sure you use ‘Reply’ and ‘Reply to all’ correctly.
Do ensure that you have a relevant "Subject" line. Leaving the subject line blank may well result in the recipient just deleting your e-mail without reading it.
Do tell your correspondent if you forward a message to somebody else to deal with, so they know who to expect a reply from.
Don't copy out an entire, long message just to add a line or two of text such as "I agree".
Don't "flame" people by sending them abusive e-mail messages.
Don't make personal remarks about third parties. E-mail messages can come back to haunt you.

6.2.4 Suitability

Don't reply to an e-mail message when angry, as you may regret it later. Once the message has been sent you will not be able to stop it being delivered.
Don’t say in an e-mail something you would hesitate to say to the recipient’s face.
Don't send unsuitable e-mail or attachments that you would hesitate to send in a memo or letter, especially anything of a sexual nature.
Don’t send anything that must stay confidential in an unencrypted e-mail. Use encryption or send a letter instead.

6.2.5 Attachments

Do remember to tell people the format of any attachments you send if they're anything other than basic Microsoft Office file types.
Don't send people large attachments unless you are sure they want to receive them.
Remember attachments can contain viruses. Don’t forward them unless you know they are clean.

6.2.6 E-mail Discussion Lists

Do be patient, especially with inexperienced e-mail users. Give people the benefit of the doubt - just because you are familiar with e-mail etiquette, it doesn't mean that they are.
Do be careful when replying to mailing list messages, or to messages sent to many recipients. Are you sure you want to reply to the whole list?
Don't send irrelevant, off-topic messages.
Don't criticise people's spelling, it is considered petty. Many people have no way of running a spell check on their messages and we all make typos.
Don't conduct arguments in public.
Don't "flame" people by sending them abusive e-mail messages.
Don't make personal remarks about third parties. E-mail messages can come back to haunt you.

6.2 Defamation

E-mails are considered to be a form of publication and the use of e-mail may constitute a libel contrary to the provisions of the Defamation Act. Both words and pictures produced in e-mails are capable of being libellous if they are untrue, ridicule a person and as a result damage that person’s reputation. For these purposes, a person may include the University or another university. You must not put any defamatory statement on the University’s computer system whether in e-mails or otherwise. As well as you being personally exposed to potential legal action for defamation, the University can also be exposed both for the actions of you as its employee/student and also as an online provider.

UWL reserves the right to remove any item that it considers may match the definition above, without notice, from any of its systems. Appropriate disciplinary action will also be considered against the individual responsible for placing such material on the UWL systems – see section 12 on the Disciplinary Measures page

6.3 Discrimination & Harassment

The University does not tolerate discrimination or harassment in any form whatsoever. This principle extends to any information distributed on the University’s system or via the Internet. You may not put on either system any material which discriminates or encourages discrimination or harassment on racial or ethnic grounds or on grounds of gender, sexual orientation, marital status, age, ethnic origin, colour, nationality, religion or disability. Please also bear in mind the University’s policy on discrimination and harassment.

Additionally, Managers should avoid bombarding the staff they supervise with e-mails containing deadlines and demands.

6.4 Contractual Liabilities

All Users need to be aware that they may enter into legally binding contracts with third parties via e-mail. At present the situation is that e-mails will be accepted as evidence of an intention to enter into such an arrangement, should it ever be challenged in court.

You should be certain that you intend to bind yourself or UWL to any arrangements you write down and send in an e-mail.

Students have no power to incur contractual liability on the part of UWL, and any attempt to create such a liability by a student will be dealt with most seriously.

6.5 Disclaimers

The practice of adding a short paragraph or two intended to protect the sending institution from legal claims arising as a result of an e-mail originated from solicitors' faxes. Given the technology, they were essential in as much as the fax could be sent to the wrong number and anyone could read what arrived at the other end. Normal practice for faxes is to put the disclaimer on the first page. However, it can be argued that as e-mail can be encrypted, using a disclaimer is meaningless because "enough care" has not been taken to safeguard the contents of the message. Also, the value of any disclaimer is subject to the sender being able and willing to identify someone who misused a message, prove misuse and take the case to court.

E-mail messages are not inherently confidential. An unencrypted e-mail is the equivalent of sending a postcard, while an encrypted e-mail is analogous to sending a letter in an envelope. E-mails go over many points in Wide Area Networks and over the Internet where they can be seen by network supervisors (and hackers). A disclaimer can only create a false sense of security, when in fact you may be breaking Data Protection regulations by transmitting personal data.

Having a disclaimer does not prevent a message from being sent to the wrong person, intercepted, being read by the wrong recipient or being used against UWL in court.
With regards to Data Protection, when transmitting personal data via e-mail, it is essential that adequate precautions are taken. The most a disclaimer can hope to achieve is to notify the recipient (or interceptor) that the contents are confidential.

For these reasons Users should not add e-mail disclaimers to their outgoing e-mails.

6.6 Viruses in e-mail

As you should be aware, there are many people who seem to delight in creating viruses for whatever reason. Viruses come in two main types.

The first type spread around the world automatically by infecting PCs and e-mail servers or e-mail software like Eudora, Outlook Express etc. The most famous of these, Melissa, ILoveU, Klez, are just the tip of the iceberg - at the time of writing there were over 73,000 individual computer viruses documented, many with multiple slight differences that bring the total nearer to 400,000 (see http://www.symantec.com/enterprise/security_response/index.jsp ). They vary in effect from being relatively harmless to extremely destructive. The anti virus software on all PCs and servers on campus is designed to block these threats automatically, but will never be 100% effective, so please do not open attachments to e-mails that have been sent to you by someone you do not know. Just delete them - it is not worth the risk. Under no circumstances should you disable or alter the settings of the anti virus software.

With some viruses these days having become adept at avoiding removal, the only sure way (and one of the quickest) to remove a virus infection is to wipe (re-format) the hard disk of the computer and load a fresh, clean software installation onto it.

The second type is spread by using psychology to get people to spread a message. These messages are not computer viruses in the true sense at all, so cannot be detected and removed by anti virus software. However, they are still harmful as they waste server resources, network bandwidth, the time of everyone who receives them and sends them on, and the time of IT Technicians. The worst sort urge you to delete files from your PC on the grounds that if you find the file the message names on your machine you have been infected by a virus. This is not true - the file named is usually a crucial system file that, if deleted, will prevent your machine from working properly in some way.

There are also the many variations on chain letters (send this to 10 people and make yourself rich), the Nigerian Money scam (come to a hotel in London, let us pay money into your account, you keep big cut) etc. etc. Even if you do not reply and instead forward the message on, it is usually a big message and hogs lots of space and bandwidth on networks.

So, to sum up,

Delete suspect e-mails with attachments that have come from unknown sources without reading them
Never alter the settings of the anti-virus software on your PC
Do not forward silly messages to lots of your colleagues or friends. Just delete them.
Never delete files on your PC just because an e-mail tells you to
Never store files on the hard disk (the C: drive) of a lab or staff PC – UCS may have to re-format it to remove a virus infection. Store them on a server instead.
If in any doubt about what to do contact the UCS Helpdesk, helpdesk@lamp.ac.uk, ext 228

6.7 E-mails sent to Staff that contain suspected child pornography

The advice below relates to staff receiving in e-mails child pornography or what they consider may be child pornography. The advice is as follows:

If you receive via the University’s e-mail system a pornographic image which you believe to depict a child, then:

Immediately close the file. Do not copy it or forward it to anyone else, for any reason.
Report the discovery to UCS. Do not discuss the matter with anyone else.
UCS will conduct a preliminary investigation to attempt to identify the sender.
If the sender appears to be a student or a member of staff of the University, UCS will report the discovery to the Pro Vice-Chancellor, who may authorise a full investigation.
If the sender cannot be identified, UCS will ensure that the image is deleted from all UWL systems.

6.8 Out of Office Auto-replies

Outlook (or Outlook Web Access) can be set to send an automatic reply to e-mails that your inbox receives when you are unavailable. However, such replies will go to the people who send you any SPAM that reaches your inbox, as well as e-mails from legitimate correspondents. Acknowledging this, your reply should be suitably bland.

The following is offered as a template for staff to adapt.

“I am currently unavailable. If your e-mail requires an urgent response please contact XXXXX@lamp.ac.uk or ring 01570 422351 and ask for extension XXX.”

Follow this with your name and job title and don’t be tempted to add anything else.

6.9 Lampeter e-mail accounts

As agreed by Senate, the official communications medium between the University of Wales Lampeter staff and its students is the university’s own e-mail system. Therefore all students are required to have a Lampeter e-mail address (e.g. xxxx@lamp.ac.uk), and staff must use this Lampeter e-mail address to communicate with them.

In particular, staff are to discontinue the practise of harvesting the private e-mail addresses of students (e.g. student@hotmail.com) to send them e-mails, as such systems are outwith the control of UWL and cannot be relied upon. Staff should actively discourage their students from sending in assignments etc. using any e-mail system other than that provided by UWL.

Adoption of this measure will confer a considerable number of benefits on both students and staff:

Documents such as information packs that many students need can be placed on the UWL web site by the webmaster and the students can be e-mailed a link to the document. This guarantees that the document students refer to is up to date as amended versions can be put on the web site quickly;

Documents that single or small groups of students need can be sent as attachments or placed in Public Folders;

Reduced printing costs;

Reduced stationery costs;

Reduced manual handling costs;

Reduced postage costs;

Guaranteed delivery of important documents, papers, assignments etc. to and from students through systems under our control.

Speedier communications;

Less post to wade through;

Less paper to file;

Accurate and up-to-date information.

It is also better for the environment as we will not be consuming natural resources to print and move vast quantities of paper around the country.

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