Types of security incident
Child pornography
On occasion, staff and students receive email messages advertising websites purporting to contain child pornography material. This can be deeply disturbing for some people, but the following advice may help you to deal with it.
First of all, visiting such a site that contains child abuse material is strictly illegal in this country. The mere act of checking that the site is what it says it is could be illegal, so please do not visit such sites.
Spam filtering
Many emails of this nature are spam. Our mail routers scan all incoming messages and mark those they think are spam. Users are advised to configure their email programs to detect such messages and either automatically delete them, or file them into a special folder.
Reporting
Finally, instances of child pornography can be reported to the Internet Watch Foundation. Websites hosted in the UK will then be dealt with by the police. The relevant authorities will be informed for sites overseas.
To report such an instance, visit the Internet Watch Foundation website and follow the instructions given. In general, you will not be asked to take part in any further investigation that may follow.
Further support
If you do not feel comfortable with this, then please report the instance to the University response team by email to cert@manchester.ac.uk and we will report the instance on your behalf.
Defamatory material
It should be emphasised that circulation of offensive or defamatory material in any form (including email) is prohibited by The University of Manchester General Regulations, Regulation XV.
Any instances of violation of this prohibition should be reported to abuse@manchester.ac.uk
Please include copies of offending material, including all email headers.
