Example of Acceptable Use Policy

1 Policy Statement

To meet the enterprise business objectives and ensure acceptable use of its information systems and networks, XXX shall adopt and follow well-defined and time-tested plans and procedures, and follow guidelines to exercise judgment regarding the use of organizational resources. XXX is deploying IT-enabled services at various internal divisions for managing its business activities. Presently XXX depends on the following IT-enabled processes for managing its business activities:

• E-tendering / E-Publishing
• Financial Accounting Package (FAP)
• E-litigation
• Procurement Monitoring System (PMS)
• Release Order (RO) Module.

The acceptable use policy and guidelines shall be communicated to and understood by all the employees of XXX. The acceptable use policy and guidelines shall be available to the CEO, GMs, DGMs, AGMs, managers.

2 Purpose

The purpose of this policy is to outline the acceptable use of computer equipment and other electronic devices at XXX. These rules are in place to protect the employee and XXX. Inappropriate use exposes XXX to cyber risks including virus attacks including ransomware, compromise of network systems and services, data breach, and legal issues. These rules are in place to protect the employees and the organization. Inappropriate use exposes XXX to risks including virus attacks, compromise of network systems and services, and legal issues.

3 Scope

3.1 Employees

This policy applies to all XXX’s Employees, Contractors, and Third Party Employees, who have access to the IT assets of XXX and may be bound by contractual agreements.

3.2 IT Assets

The policy is applicable to all Hardware assets, Software assets, Network assets, and Utilities, including Air conditioners, Power, and telecommunications services (that serve IT assets of XXX). Equipment owned by third parties, but in the custody of XXX, will also be covered under the scope.

3.3 Documentation

The documentation shall consist of an Acceptable Use Policy, guidelines, and policies & procedures for acceptable use of each service.

3.4 Document Control

The Acceptable Use Policy document and all other referenced documents shall be controlled. Version control shall be to preserve the latest release and the previous version of any document. However, the previous version of the documents shall be retained only for a period of two years for legal and knowledge preservation purpose.

3.5 Records

Records being generated as part of the Acceptable Use Policy shall be retained for a period of two years. Records shall be in hard copy or electronic media. The records shall be owned by the respective system administrators and shall be audited once a year.

3.6 Distribution and Maintenance

The Acceptable Use Policy document shall be made available to all the employees covered in the scope. All the changes and new releases of this document shall be made available to the persons concerned. The maintenance responsibility of the document shall be with the CISO and system administrators.

4 Privacy

The Acceptable Use Policy document shall be considered as “confidential” and shall be made available to the concerned persons with proper access control. Subsequent changes and versions of this document shall be controlled.

5 Responsibility

1. The Acceptable Use Policy shall be implemented by the CISO / designated personnel.
2. Information Security Management is responsible for maintaining this policy and advising generally on information security controls. Working in conjunction with other corporate functions, it is also responsible for running educational activities to raise awareness and understanding of the responsibilities identified in this policy.
3. IT Department is responsible for building, configuring, operating, and maintaining the corporate email facilities (including anti-spam, anti-malware, and other email security controls) in accordance with this policy.
4. IT Help/Service Desk is responsible for assisting users with secure use of email facilities and acts as a focal point for reporting email security incidents.
5. All relevant employees are responsible for complying with this and other corporate policies at all times. This policy also applies to third-party employees acting in a similar capacity whether they are explicitly bound (e.g. by contractual terms and conditions) or implicitly bound (e.g. by generally held standards of acceptable behavior) to comply with our information security policies.
6. Internal Audit is authorized to assess compliance with this and other corporate policies at any time.

6. Policy

6.1 General Use and Ownership

a. While the security administration of XXX desires to provide a reasonable level of privacy, users should be aware that the data they create on corporate systems remains the property of XXX. Because of the need to protect the IT assets of XXX, management cannot guarantee the confidentiality of personal information stored on an IT asset belonging to XXX.
b. Employees are responsible for exercising good judgment regarding the reasonableness of personal use. Individual departments are responsible for creating guidelines concerning personal use of Internet and Intranet systems. In the absence of such policies, employees should be guided by departmental policies on personal use, and if there is any uncertainty, employees should consult their supervisor or manager.
c. It is recommended that any information that users consider sensitive or vulnerable be protected. For guidelines on information classification, refer to “Information classification and handling policy”.
d. For IT system security and network maintenance purposes, authorized individuals within XXX shall monitor equipment, systems, and network traffic at any time, as per its IT Audit Policy or orders issued by the competent authority.
e. XXX reserves the right to audit networks and systems on a periodic basis to ensure compliance with this policy.

6.2 Security and Proprietary Information

a. The user interface for information contained on the Internet and Intranet-related systems shall be classified accordingly. Employees shall take all necessary steps to prevent unauthorized access to this information.
b. Authorized users shall be responsible for the security of their passwords and accounts.
c. Encryption of information, if used, shall be in compliance with XXX’s Cryptographic Control Usage Policy.
d. Information contained on portable computers shall be protected.
e. Users and employees shall use suitable procedures and guidelines for acceptable use of E-mail and internet resources.

6.3 Unacceptable Use

Under no circumstances is an employee of XXX authorized to engage in any activity that is illegal under national or international law while utilizing XXX-owned resources. The guidelines for Acceptable Use can be referred for a list of activities that fall under the category of unacceptable use.

The lists below are by no means exhaustive but attempt to provide a framework for activities which fall into the category of unacceptable use.

1. System and Network Activities

The following activities are strictly prohibited, with no exceptions:

1. Violations of the rights of any person or company protected by copyright, trade secret, patent or other intellectual property, or similar laws or regulations, including, but not limited to, the installation or distribution of “pirated” or other software products that are not appropriately licensed for use by XXX
2. Unauthorized copying of copyrighted material including, but not limited to, digitization and distribution of photographs from magazines, books or other copyrighted sources, copyrighted music, and the installation of any copyrighted software for which XXX or the end user does not have an active license is strictly prohibited.
3. Accessing data, a server, or an account for any purpose other than conducting XXX business, even if you have authorized access, is prohibited.
4. Exporting software, technical information, encryption software or technology, in violation of international or regional export control laws, is illegal. The appropriate management should be consulted prior to export of any material that is in question.
5. Introduction of malicious programs into the network or server (e.g., viruses, worms, trojan horses, ransomware, etc.).
6. Revealing your account password/passphrase to others or allowing use of your account by others. This includes family and other household members when work is being done at home.
7. Using a XXX computing asset to actively engage in procuring or transmitting material that is in violation of sexual harassment or hostile workplace laws in the user’s local jurisdiction.
8. Making fraudulent offers of products, items, or services originating from any XXX account.
9. Making statements about warranty, expressly or implied, unless it is a part of normal job duties.
10. Effecting security breaches or disruptions of network communication. Security breaches include, but are not limited to, accessing data of which the employee is not an intended recipient or logging into a server or account that the employee is not expressly authorized to access, unless these duties are within the scope of regular duties. For purposes of this section, “disruption” includes, but is not limited to, network sniffing, ping floods, packet spoofing, denial of service, brute-forcing accounts, and forged routing information for malicious purposes.
11. Port scanning or security scanning is expressly prohibited unless prior notification to the Infosec Team is made.
12. Executing any form of network monitoring which will intercept data not intended for the employee’s host, unless this activity is a part of the employee’s normal job/duty.
13. Circumventing user authentication or security of any host, network, or account.
14. Introducing honeypots, honeynets, or similar technology on the XXX network.
15. Interfering with or denying service to any user other than the employee’s host (for example, denial of service attack).
16. Using any program/script/command, or sending messages of any kind, with the intent to interfere with, or disable, a user’s terminal session, via any means, locally or via the Internet/Intranet/Extranet.
17. Providing information about, or lists of, XXX employees to parties outside XXX

2. Email and Communication Activities

When using company resources to access and use the Internet, users must realize they represent the company. Whenever employees state an affiliation to the company, they must also clearly indicate that “the opinions expressed are my own and not necessarily those of the company”. Questions may be addressed to the IT Department

1. Sending unsolicited email messages, including the sending of “junk mail” or other advertising material to individuals who did not specifically request such material (email spam).
2. Any form of harassment via email, telephone, text, or paging, whether through language, frequency, or size of messages.
3. Unauthorized use, or forging, of email header information.
4. Solicitation of email for any other email address, other than that of the poster’s account, with the intent to harass or to collect replies.
5. Creating or forwarding “chain letters”, “Ponzi” or other “pyramid” schemes of any type.
6. Use of unsolicited email originating from within XXX’s networks of other Internet/Intranet/Extranet service providers on behalf of, or to advertise, any service hosted by XXX or connected via XXX’s network.
7. Posting the same or similar non-business-related messages to large numbers of Usenet newsgroups (newsgroup spam).

3 Blogging and Social Media

1. Blogging or posting to social media platforms by employees, whether using XXX’s property and systems or personal computer systems, is also subject to the terms and restrictions set forth in this Policy. Limited and occasional use of XXX’s systems to engage in blogging or other online posting is acceptable, provided that it is done in a professional and responsible manner, does not otherwise violate XXX’s policy, is not detrimental to XXX’s best interests, and does not interfere with an employee’s regular work duties. Blogging or other online posting from XXX’s systems is also subject to monitoring.
2. XXX’s Confidential Information policy also applies to blogging. As such, Employees are prohibited from revealing any confidential or proprietary information, trade secrets or any other material covered by ’s Confidential Information policy when engaged in blogging.
3. Employees shall not engage in any blogging that may harm or tarnish the image, reputation and/or goodwill of XXX and/or any of its employees. Employees are also prohibited from making any discriminatory, disparaging, defamatory or harassing comments when blogging or otherwise engaging in any conduct prohibited by XXX’s Non-Discrimination and Anti-Harassment policy.
4. Employees may also not attribute personal statements, opinions or beliefs to XXX when engaged in blogging. If an employee is expressing his or her beliefs and/or opinions in blogs, the employee may not, expressly, or implicitly, represent themselves as an employee or representative of XXXEmployees assume any and all risk associated with blogging.
5. Apart from following all laws pertaining to the handling and disclosure of copyrighted or export-controlled materials, XXX’s trademarks, logos and any other XXX intellectual property may also not be used in connection with any blogging or social media activity
6. Policy Compliance

6.4 Compliance Measurement

The IT Team will verify compliance to this policy through various methods, including but not limited to, business tool reports, internal and external audits, and feedback to the policy owner.

7 Enforcement

Any employee found to have violated this policy may be subjected to disciplinary action in line with the HR Policy.

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