Toshiba Makes the Grade at Upstate NY School District
Leaders at Pittsford Central School District (PCSD) in Western New York understood the necessity to reevaluate their security status to ensure it met district policy standards. With more than 7,000 students, teachers, and administrative staff in the district, countless vital documents such as report cards, transcripts, and final exams were being distributed in both hard copy and electronic forms. Document security was paramount to ensure this confidential information wouldn’t be accidentally left at the printer. This would play an important role as the school district made plans to replace its multifunction printer (MFP) fleet.
Security Assessment Points To Key Improvement Areas
PCSD chief information officer Jeff Cimmerer, Ed.D., led this security project. His goal was to find a vendor capable of providing best-in-class document security solutions worthy of this high-performing district (both of PCSD’s high schools consistently rank in the top 100 schools in the nation according to U.S. News & World Report). The aim was to promote competition using comparable or enhanced document equipment while meeting budgetary requirements as past providers weren’t addressing the school district’s finance, productivity, or data security needs.
Dr. Cimmerer engaged a third-party to implement a network security assessment, which led to their recommendation to approach Toshiba regarding a free security analysis of their existing fleet. Upon conclusion of the analysis, he learned which areas the district needed to improve. Specifically, auditors noticed confidential documents were occasionally left behind upon printing and copying making it possible for others to walk away with sensitive data. To resolve the potential problem, Toshiba’s team of sales and solutions professionals recommended allowing the current ID badges worn by PCSD’s staff to integrate with the Toshiba award-winning MFP product line. This would allow employees to send a print from their desk to the MFP and have it instantly print by swiping their badge at the device, ensuring confidential documents wouldn’t be left sitting in the tray.
ID card print release software was first implemented in the district’s main office to set a best practice standard. As Toshiba MFPs were installed throughout campus the secure print release software was added, eliminating abandoned prints.
Protecting Data, Maintaining Compliance
Toshiba’s audit further uncovered the need to cleanse PCSD’s current fleet hard drives of potential protected information (HIPAA/ FERPA)* residing on their current copiers before returning the devices to their previous vendor. To mitigate this concern moving forward, the entire new Toshiba output fleet was shipped with the company’s unique Self-Encrypting Drive with Automatic Data Invalidation to virtually eliminate the possibility of anyone accessing data on the hard drive should they attempt to remove and install it into another device.
With this first phase working smoothly within the district, Dr. Cimmerer is already formulating plans for future Toshiba partnerships. One consideration will likely center on transitioning paper files into an electronic format for more secure storage and easier retrieval for the vast amounts of data the district already has and will continue to accumulate.
