Under the university’s Acceptable Use Policy and a new Maryland law (HB718), UMD email accounts are intended to support university and state business. Personal accounts have also created operational, legal, and compliance challenges for the university.
This list is not exhaustive, but provides a framework to help you decide what data is or is not appropriate to download.
Emails related to university operations, personnel matters, research, students, contracts, or official decisions may be subject to retention laws, audits, litigation holds, FERPA, or Maryland public records requirements. Exporting these messages for personal retention could create compliance or security concerns.
Messages containing FERPA-protected student information, HR records, financial data, or other Level 3 High data should not be transferred into unsecured personal storage or consumer email accounts.
For information on how to download data from your UMD account, refer to these resources:
In addition to storing files on your personal device, it is recommended to store data in a cloud storage service, an external hard drive/SSD, or both as a backup.
A good place to start is a cloud storage service for documents, photos, and ongoing access across devices. These services require an internet connection and can be accessed on any device if you log in to your account. For example:
External hard drives or solid-state drives (SSDs) are a good option if you want local and physical backups of photos, videos, and exported files. SSDs are generally faster and more reliable than traditional hard drives. External hard drives and SSDs do not require internet access, but they typically have to be physically connected to your device to access the data.
Some services allow you to migrate the data of your UMD account into a personal account. Below are resources on migrating data for some of these accounts. If your application does not offer a migration tool, you will have to export data from your UMD account and upload it to your personal account.