{"id":29488,"date":"2025-09-30T09:43:23","date_gmt":"2025-09-30T13:43:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/?p=29488"},"modified":"2025-10-01T09:10:52","modified_gmt":"2025-10-01T13:10:52","slug":"michigan-medicine-introduces-two-year-email-retention-policy-to-strengthen-data-security","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/2025\/09\/30\/michigan-medicine-introduces-two-year-email-retention-policy-to-strengthen-data-security\/","title":{"rendered":"Michigan Medicine introduces two-year email retention policy to strengthen data security"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Aerial
To reduce the risk of data breaches, Michigan Medicine is making email safer and simpler for its users. (Photo courtesy Michigan Medicine.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Have you ever kept important emails in your inbox, maybe ones with attachments like your tax return or family photographs? Are there messages you wouldn\u2019t dream of deleting, like an award nomination or a kind note from a friend?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Justin Sivils, business systems analyst lead for Michigan Medicine\u2019s Information Assurance (IA), says many treat inboxes in that way: like digital filing cabinets. \u201cDecisions are made, workflows are hashed out, files are sent, and people just leave it [in their email].\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The risk? Email is one of the main ways cyber criminals try to gain access to sensitive information, which can then be sold for a profit. Sivils compares it to leaving your phone in your car; it\u2019s relatively easy to steal if a nefarious being gazes upon it through the glass. \u201cIt’s their favorite tactic. They go there because they know people use email like this.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These brute-force attacks, Sivils stresses, get access to big files with a lot of data. \u201cOr in this case,\u201d he adds, \u201cpatient records.\u201d In 2022, a security event involving patient information prompted Michigan Medicine leadership to launch a review of practices and consider ways to strengthen data protection. Among the recommendations was an email retention policy, which is standard at many institutions but new for Michigan Medicine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Early discussions considered starting with a four-year limit that would gradually move to two years, allowing time for adjustment. After careful consideration, leadership chose to roll-out the two-year policy for all staff at once, aligning with time frames commonly used across many industries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new guidelines are simple. Emails older than two years will automatically be deleted. Forever. There\u2019s no secret way to get them back. Based on analysis, Sivils notes, \u201cEmails older than that, people tend to not look at anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the business decision was made by Michigan Medicine, IA\u2019s role was to help carry out the policy by ensuring they are applied consistently and correctly across the organization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Push back wasn\u2019t surprising. Sivils empathizes with the response and feels most just needed a sounding board. \u201cAfter a conversation, they understand why they have to move their \u2018[phone] out of their car\u2019,\u201d observes Sivils. \u201cIt was unexpected. That\u2019s why we had such a visceral reaction.\u201d While the response was strong, leadership chose to implement the change quickly to keep the organization safe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Michigan Medicine, the change is less about deleting messages and more about reducing threats. It\u2019s a reminder that technological habits shape how vulnerable we are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIT changes so quickly\u2026 it\u2019s deeply integrated into our lives. The impacts [of identity theft] are very real,\u201d Sivils explains. \u201cPeople can lose their livelihoods \u2026 with identity theft if they\u2019re not careful.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He continues, \u201cFor younger generations, technology has always been there. Many of us remember life before the internet at home, but for them, it\u2019s simply part of the world. That makes it easy to forget how fast things can unravel. Security risks don\u2019t just affect millennials, Gen Z, or boomers. Younger people are just as vulnerable. And too often, people think, \u2018It can\u2019t happen to me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, Michigan Medicine shows a small notice when opening a message, alerting users when it will be automatically deleted. To help staff preserve important emails, Michigan Medicine offers tools like OneNote<\/a> that help cataloging messages<\/a>. Perfect for organizing emails you want to keep, like that heartfelt note or a file you\u2019ll need later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new requirement can feel like a loss, but Sivils frames it as a gain: a chance to start fresh.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To reduce the risk of data breaches, Michigan Medicine is making email safer and simpler for its users.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":180,"featured_media":29490,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_umich_oidc_access":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,4],"tags":[159,402,121,23],"class_list":["post-29488","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-projects-services","category-features","tag-email","tag-michigan-medicine","tag-privacy","tag-security"],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez.jpg",1035,582,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez-400x266.jpg",400,266,true],"medium":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez-300x169.jpg",300,169,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez-768x432.jpg",665,374,true],"large":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez-600x337.jpg",600,337,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez.jpg",1035,582,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez.jpg",1035,582,false],"excerpt-thumbnail":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez-200x140.jpg",200,140,true],"themonic-thumbnail":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez-60x42.jpg",60,42,true],"ioslider-thumbnail":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez-658x300.jpg",658,300,true],"post-thumbnail":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez-665x374.jpg",665,374,true],"400x250-crop":["https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/medical_campus_aerial-LR-Nunez-400x250.jpg",400,250,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Lisa Nu\u00f1ez, HITS","author_link":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/author\/lnunez\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"To reduce the risk of data breaches, Michigan Medicine is making email safer and simpler for its users.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29488","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/180"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29488"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29488\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29492,"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29488\/revisions\/29492"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29488"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29488"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michigan.it.umich.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29488"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}