Security & Retention of Information

Data sharing means making your data available to others for their own purposes. When we talk about sharing information, we mean that we’re providing others with access to your data in a way that allows them to use it for their own purposes.

Unless required by law or to help protect the safety, property, or rights of UMD and/or members of the university community, the University of Maryland does not share your data. Currently, the University of Maryland is required to share your information with US Federal and State Agencies for regulatorily-required reports.

On the other hand, the University of Maryland uses service providers to support its business activities. When we use these providers, we are using their tools to process, store, or manage your data on the University of Maryland’s behalf. These third parties only handle your data in ways that are necessary to deliver the services we provide to you. They do not have the right to access or use your data for their own purposes. UMD also complies with the disclosure requirements of the Federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act.

Unless restricted by law, information provided to the University of Maryland may be shared among offices within the university as necessary or appropriate in the conduct of legitimate university business or educational interests, and as consistent with applicable law.

Individuals have rights regarding their personally identifiable information under applicable University of Maryland policies and state law. These rights include:

1. The right to request correction of personally identifiable information related to the individual.
2. The right to request deletion of personally identifiable information related to the individual.
3. The right to request information about the sharing of personally identifiable information with third parties, including a listing of the third parties, the information shared, and the purpose of sharing the information.
4. The right to opt out of the sharing of personally identifiable information with a third party, where applicable.

If you wish to make any of these requests, please fill out this form.

To enhance your experience, we may place “cookies” on your computer or device. Cookies are files that store information about your website visits, preferences, and interactions. When you access umd.edu, the following cookies may be placed on your device, depending on your web browser settings:

• Purpose: Google Analytics cookies count visits and traffic sources in order to measure and improve the performance of our website. See details about Google Analytics’ usage of cookies on websites and privacy policy.
• Opt-out: You can opt out of Google’s add personalization from Google Ads Settings. Find out more about managing cookies through your browser.
• Browse in private: If you don’t want Google Chrome to remember your activity, you can browse the web privately in Incognito mode. 

Some of the pages on our website have embedded social media sharing buttons. Social media platforms use cookies or other tracking technologies when a button is embedded on our website. We do not have access to or control of any information collected through these buttons. The social media platforms are responsible for how they use your information. For specific privacy controls on how these buttons track how users access our website, see the cookies policies of Twitter/X, Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.

The University of Maryland recognizes the importance of maintaining the security of the information it collects and maintains, and we endeavor to protect information from unauthorized access and damage. The University of Maryland strives to ensure reasonable security measures are in place, including physical, administrative, and technical safeguards to protect your personal information.

This privacy notice may be updated from time to time. We will post the date our notice was last updated at the top of this privacy notice.

If you have any concerns or questions about how your personal data is used, please contact our Privacy Committee at umd-privacy@umd.edu 

We strive to keep personal data in our records only as long as they are necessary for the purposes they were collected and processed. Retention periods vary and are established considering our legitimate purposes and all applicable legal requirements.