MINES’ POLICY LIBRARY

This document details Colorado School of Mines (“Mines”) policies for the creation and ownership of Mines-affiliated Internet domain names. It assigns responsibility for the registration and maintenance of these domain names to Computing, Communications, and Information Technologies (CCIT).

“Mines-affiliated domain names” are defined as domain names with any of these features:

• They are purchased with Colorado School of Mines funds;
• They are registered for the official use of Mines faculty, staff, or student organizations;
• They are used by consortia in which Mines is the principal participant in a joint venture;
• They are used by consortia in which Mines has been designated the official owner and maintainer of the applicable domain name.

1.1 Rationale

Mines-affiliated domain names registered privately by Mines-affiliated individuals can be unsustainable. Sometimes the owner forgets to renew the domain-name registration, exposing the website to cyber-squatting, or the individual responsible for the domain exits Mines without transferring ownership or passwords to a successor, leaving the site registration unmanageable.

By promulgating this policy document, the purchase and maintenance of domain names will be centralized and under the authority of CCIT to ensure a sustainable and reliable management apparatus.

All Mines entities are encouraged to have a web presence in the main school web infrastructure. Standardized domain (or sub-domain) names are available to all Mines students, faculty, staff, departments, research groups, and other entities.

• Academic entities are typically assigned web addresses like https://name.mines.edu.
• Administrative departments are typically assigned web addresses in the form https://mines.edu/name.
• Individuals may request web addresses in the form https://people.mines.edu/username.
• Student organizations may request web addresses in the form: https://orgs.mines.edu/name.

In addition, members of the Mines community may request non-standard domain names to meet particular programmatic, bureaucratic, or branding considerations. The domain names for such sites (and corresponding security certificates) are managed by CCIT.

The Office of Communications and Marketing and CCIT will ask owners to carefully consider domain-name choices and make sure the resulting web address is tasteful, descriptive, reasonably short, appropriately branded, and follows customary usage (e.g., using .org rather than .com).

Note that ownership of a domain name (the subject of this document) is separate from the branding and design of the website associated with that domain name. The Office of Communications and Marketing publishes branding and graphics guidelines here: http://www.minesnewsroom.com/resources. The design and branding of consortia websites owned by a partnership of Mines and non-Mines identities (which would typically not be exclusively Mines branded) will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis by the Office of Communications and Marketing.

3.1 Registration of a new domain name

• All domain-registration requests for Mines-affiliated domains should be submitted to CCIT via the Mines Help Center “Helpdesk” (https://helpdesk.mines.edu). CCIT will evaluate the request and respond with appropriate questions.
• Domains registered outside this procedure are deemed to be in violation of this policy document. Such domains should be transferred to CCIT as soon as possible. The transfer may also be initiated with a support request via the Mines Help Center “Helpdesk.”
• Domain registration and management will be the responsibility of CCIT, which will work with the entity requesting the domain to configure network settings for the resulting site as needed.
• Domain registration fees will be paid by CCIT.

This policy will be administered by Computing, Communications, and Information Technologies (CCIT). Requests for exceptions to this policy may be addressed to the CCIT Chief Information Security Officer via the Technology Support Center “Helpdesk” at https://helpdesk.mines.edu.

The policy will be reviewed at least as needed by the Responsible Administrative Unit.

Issued: May 21, 2018