As a reminder, one of the essential information governance controls within the public sector requires us to classify and label all emails and documents in accordance with the Government Security Classifications (GSC). This scheme is designed to help individuals determine and indicate toothers the levels of protection required to prevent the compromise of valuable or sensitive information.
Classification is therefore necessary to ensure all our documents are properly labelled to keep them safe. This means that any documents, files, or information you create must be clearly labelled with one of the categories to make sure that everyone knows its classification and how it can be used, viewed and shared.
The Council’s e-mail and document classification software is built into our Microsoft Office suite. It is easy to use and the attached help guide provides all the information you need, so please take a few moments to refresh your knowledge. The responsibility for correctly classifying an email or document lies with its creator and it should not be routinely changed without their knowledge/permission.
There are 3 classifications, namely :-
This is any public sector e-mail or document that does not contain personal, sensitive, or confidential information. This is the minimum classification for all of the Public Sector, no physical label will be applied if the item is printed, but the item will be electronically ‘tagged’ and a banner displayed on the screen.
This is any information that would normally be considered confidential in nature but does NOT contain any information relating to individuals (e.g. non-personal).
This is sensitive information that also either identifies, relates to or is about an individual or group of individuals. You can review the personal data flowchart on TED to see if something constitutes personal data or not.
If you have any questions regarding the use of the classification labels, please contact the IT Service Desk via the IT Service Desk Portal or on 01255 686599 if the issue is urgent.