VU Gmail:
Investigating the relationship between Google and Vanderbilt Students
Vanderbilt uses Google’s email service, Gmail, for its students’ email addresses and services. Rather than using the publicly available Gmail service, Vanderbilt, like many other universities, has a contract with Google to use Google Apps for Education. This collaboration between Google and Vanderbilt has both costs and benefits that we believe are important to consider.
Benefits
Some of the many benefits offered by Vanderbilt’s switch to Gmail services include, but are by no means limited to the benefits seen below.
Benefits: Financial Issues
- Using Gmail likely saves Vanderbilt money. According to The Chronicle of Higher Education, Temple University saved $1 million by switching to Google’s services.
Benefits: Improved Services to Vanderbilt Students
- Gmail offers a far superior system to the old VU webmail system. It is more user friendly, offers more storage space, and has features such as Google Docs, Google calendar, and GChat, just to name a few.
Costs
Some of the many costs incurred by Vanderbilt, and more often, by Vanderbilt students as a result of the switch are listed below. Unlike the old VU webmail system, VUGmail is not owned by Vanderbilt, and thus ownership, copyright, privacy, retention, access, and legal protection issues are affected differently than in Vanderbilt’s past.
Costs: Ownership, Copyright, Privacy, and Retention Issues
When you use Gmail services, Gmail’s Terms of Service says:
In other words, Google is free to use, alter, publicly publish, display and distribute any and all of your communications sent through their services. This includes all emails, Google Docs, GChat conversations, Google Calendar contents, etc. This becomes risky when Gmail is used to communicate sensitive or private information. Not only does Gmail have rights to these communications, but it archives all communications and retains them indefinitely. Gmail’s Privacy Notice reads: "residual copies of deleted messages and accounts may take up to 60 days to be deleted from our active servers and may remain in our offline backup systems." This vastly increases the permanence of email messages sent through Gmail (and VU Gmail), and thus increases the potential for these messages to impact the future of the Gmail users who send and receive them.
Additionally, Gmail’s extensive retention practices heighten the risk that would be incurred by users if their Gmail accounts were hacked into by outside parties. For example, in 2009 the Gmail accounts of a couple of Chinese human rights activists were accessed by hackers in China. This raises concerns for students who are required to use Gmail as their primary email service for classroom and university communications. The more information an email service records and retains about a user, the more important protection of that email service’s information database is.
As a result of Google’s Terms of Service, Vanderbilt Professors do not use Gmail or the Gmail services offered through Vanderbilt. We question why Vanderbilt professors have been allowed to keep their VU webmail accounts, while Vanderbilt now requires that all undergraduate students use the VUGmail system. The inconsistency between email services available to students and professors seems to indicate that Vanderbilt values privacy for professors higher than it does for its students. While there may be other reasons for this discrepancy, we believe this is a question that must be investigated.
It should be noted that Google reserves the right to unilaterally change the terms of their privacy policy at any time. Fortunately, Vanderbilt also retains the right through their agreement with Google to terminate the agreement and all VU Gmail accounts and services.
- 11. Content license from you
- 11.1 You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the Services and may be revoked for certain Services as defined in the Additional Terms of those Services.
- 11.2 You agree that this license includes a right for Google to make such Content available to other companies, organizations or individuals with whom Google has relationships for the provision of syndicated services, and to use such Content in connection with the provision of those services.
- 11.3 You understand that Google, in performing the required technical steps to provide the Services to our users, may (a) transmit or distribute your Content over various public networks and in various media; and (b) make such changes to your Content as are necessary to conform and adapt that Content to the technical requirements of connecting networks, devices, services or media. You agree that this license shall permit Google to take these actions.
- 11.4 You confirm and warrant to Google that you have all the rights, power and authority necessary to grant the above license.
In other words, Google is free to use, alter, publicly publish, display and distribute any and all of your communications sent through their services. This includes all emails, Google Docs, GChat conversations, Google Calendar contents, etc. This becomes risky when Gmail is used to communicate sensitive or private information. Not only does Gmail have rights to these communications, but it archives all communications and retains them indefinitely. Gmail’s Privacy Notice reads: "residual copies of deleted messages and accounts may take up to 60 days to be deleted from our active servers and may remain in our offline backup systems." This vastly increases the permanence of email messages sent through Gmail (and VU Gmail), and thus increases the potential for these messages to impact the future of the Gmail users who send and receive them.
Additionally, Gmail’s extensive retention practices heighten the risk that would be incurred by users if their Gmail accounts were hacked into by outside parties. For example, in 2009 the Gmail accounts of a couple of Chinese human rights activists were accessed by hackers in China. This raises concerns for students who are required to use Gmail as their primary email service for classroom and university communications. The more information an email service records and retains about a user, the more important protection of that email service’s information database is.
As a result of Google’s Terms of Service, Vanderbilt Professors do not use Gmail or the Gmail services offered through Vanderbilt. We question why Vanderbilt professors have been allowed to keep their VU webmail accounts, while Vanderbilt now requires that all undergraduate students use the VUGmail system. The inconsistency between email services available to students and professors seems to indicate that Vanderbilt values privacy for professors higher than it does for its students. While there may be other reasons for this discrepancy, we believe this is a question that must be investigated.
It should be noted that Google reserves the right to unilaterally change the terms of their privacy policy at any time. Fortunately, Vanderbilt also retains the right through their agreement with Google to terminate the agreement and all VU Gmail accounts and services.
Costs: Access to Student Emails
Because student emails are retained by Vanderbilt for some period of time (seeour discussion of Vanderbilt's Acceptable Use Policy), and Google archives all emails sent through its services, both Vanderbilt and Google have access to student email communications. For more on Vanderbilt’s policies regarding student email access and use, see Vanderbilt's Acceptable Use Policy.
Costs: Legal Protection
In multiple court cases, Gmail has been required to turn over a suspect’s Gmail account as evidence. This is not to say that the same thing could not happen on the old webmail system, but Gmail’s extensive retention policy would make the implications of this court action far more invasive. Additionally, because student emails are now sent through a system owned by Google, rather than the university, this outsourcing of email changes the legal gatekeeper and guardian of student email accounts.
The more services get outsourced, the less power the university has to protect its students. This is not to say that all students want their university to be their protectors, but this shift will, and to some extent has already, changed the relationship between universities and their students.
The more services get outsourced, the less power the university has to protect its students. This is not to say that all students want their university to be their protectors, but this shift will, and to some extent has already, changed the relationship between universities and their students.
Your Voice Can Make a Difference!
While many universities have outsourced their email services to Google and Microsoft, some universities have resisted making the switch. One example of this is Yale University, which has postponed their switch to Gmail to 2015 at the earliest. Students, professors, and administrators alike have raised concerns with the issues detailed above, and their voices have been heard. These stories give us hope that the mission of this website – informing students and encouraging them to critique surveillance systems – can produce real results at Vanderbilt.
