Youngstown State University, through its website, collects non-personal information to improve functionality and content, and to monitor the site's performance. Examples include collecting information on browser type, operating system, Internet Service Provider (ISP), and geographic location (i.e., country, state, and city where user is connecting from). Data is used to provide answers to specific questions about the usage and performance of the web site or individual web pages. We may use your IP address to help diagnose problems with our server and to administer our Web site by identifying (1) which parts of our site are most heavily used, and (2) which portion of our audience comes from within the YSU network. We do not link IP addresses to anything personally identifiable. This means that user sessions will be tracked, but the users will remain anonymous.
An example includes the use of cookies on the YSU website. Cookies are used in order to maintain login information between a web application and an end user’s computer (i.e., Penguin Portal). This identifies the end user’s computer to the web application upon logging in. We use tracking cookies (i.e., Google Analytics code) in order to obtain statistical information on university website traffic. This helps with improving website design and marketing efforts. No personally identifiable information is collected on end users. Users are able to disable cookies in their browser of choice if they so choose.
The YSU website makes use of SSL (i.e., secure socket layer) technology for transmitting sensitive information in fillable forms to either an e-mail address or a database. Forms secured by SSL contain a web address (i.e., URL) that is preceded by https which encrypts data being transmitted.