Web Policies

1. URL's:

All official websites for groups within the School of Medicine must have a .edu URL extension. To avoid conflict of interest issues, .com and .org URL's cannot be used. If you feel a particular site should be exempted, please contact Michael Halaas.

2. Design requirements

In 2004 the Executive Committee set in motion a project to increase the usability of the School's websites by providing design standards for all departments, divisions, centers, and institutes within the School of Medicine. These design standards are intentionally flexible to accommodate unique online identies for individual units when desired. The standards provide a coordinated identity and navigation scheme school-wide and create a logical experience for users as they traverse our various sites. By default, all official units of the School must use the standard templates. If your group would like to develop a unique design, IRT must be involved in the process to insure your site will fit in with the overall online presence for the School of Medicine.

Sites for individual faculty or research labs are exempt from this requirement.

3. Privacy and Security

Content authors are responsible for insuring that information published on School of Medicine web sites does not violate HIPAA or FERPA requirements. Reasonable measures must be taken to protect the security of pages that contain protected health information. In general this means that access to these pages needs to be tightly controlled and the content must be deliverd via SSL for encryption. We are happy to discuss sites/pages in detail if you have any questions.

4. eCommerce

Web authors should be familiar with the University ecommerce policy in the Admin Guide. Stanford has contracted with an internet commerce transaction services vendor to handle the authorization and management of electronic orders. This arrangement allows the University to:

Consistently require the vendor to take necessary and reasonable steps to ensure that transactions are secure,
Assure appropriate integration with University financial systems,
Ensure that parties comply with Stanford name use and privacy policies,
Use tested emergency response and recovery procedures,
Leverage University transactions to reduce costs, and
Provide current technology and support for developing applications.

School of Medicine web authors who wish to use eCommerce can make use of the university-approved application, "Register 1-2-3". Please contact web help for assistance.

5. Terms of Use

All web authors should be familiar with the University terms of use.