University of Michigan

NOTICE: Internet Restored on All U-M Campuses

Dear U-M community,

Thank you for your patience during our recent service disruption. I am happy to inform you that internet connectivity and WiFi has been restored on all U-M campuses. You should be able to connect as normal from any device.

We expect some issues with select U-M systems and services in the short term, and not all of our remediation efforts are complete. However, they will be resolved over the next several days.

We will be posting announcements about any service interruptions on the ITS status page. Please contact our Service Center for technical assistance if needed.

The investigative work into the security issue continues, and we are not able to share any information that might compromise the investigation. We appreciate your understanding as we continue to move through the investigative process.

In true Wolverine fashion, faculty, staff and students rose to the occasion and met the challenge to ensure continuity of our mission.

We extend a special thank you to the Information and Technology Services team who all worked tirelessly to address this challenge. We all appreciate all you have done, and continue to do, to maintain the safety of our enterprise systems.

Sincerely,

Santa J. Ono
President

Ravi Pendse PhD
Vice President for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer
University of Michigan

UPDATE: TEMPORARY INTERNET OUTAGE ON ALL U-M CAMPUSES

While a universitywide internet outage continues to affect operations at the Ann Arbor, Dearborn and Flint campuses, Information and Technology Services is working continuously toward restoring service. Faculty, staff and students can now authenticate into their U-M accounts. Access to cloud-based services has been restored. Functioning systems are accessible from off-campus or cellular networks. Updates will be shared at umich.edu and @umichtech on Twitter.

• Information for U-M employees
• Q&A: Monthly payroll to be paid on time, and other issues
• Message from President Ono about internet disruption

Information for U-M Employees

While the teams at ITS work to restore internet access on campus and additional online services, here are some reminders for U-M employees:

Annual merit processing: Most data was already loaded to the system before the disruption to our computer systems. Merit pay changes do not take effect until Sept. 1 for the Sept. 30 pay date (for monthly paid employees). The university will monitor the situation based on the duration of the system outage.

Benefits: Eligible faculty, staff and students who were unable to complete elections by their 30-day enrollment deadline due to the system outages will be provided with additional time. Affected individuals will be notified by email with instructions for completing their benefit elections.

Facilities and Operations: Maintenance requests are being prioritized, and delays may be required for some requests.

Parking: For those working on campus, Logistics, Transportation and Parking has lifted parking gates to ensure access for employees with proper permits.

Payroll: August monthly pay ran as normal and will be paid on Aug. 31. There should be no disruption for direct deposits or for those receiving hard copy paychecks. August timekeeping data was used for this month’s payroll as entered and approved prior to the outage.

Procurement Services: Several systems are currently inaccessible, including M-Marketsite and MPathways eProcurement.

Purchasing: Excluding medical devices, current ordering processes remain in effect with U-M business units or university-contracted suppliers that accept short codes. For emergency purchases with suppliers that do not accept short codes, please use a PCard. Please note that $5,000 is the standard credit limit on PCards, unless an increase was previously requested. 

For information on your current credit limit and how much is remaining, please contact JP Morgan Chase Customer Service at 800-316-6056. You can request a temporary PCard credit limit increase to accommodate your purchases or contact Procurement Services at procurement.supervisors@umich.edu for additional assistance making emergent purchases. For Michigan Medicine medical device orders, please follow department down-time procedures and work closely with supply staff at each location.

Remote work: Employees should consult with their direct supervisors about additional flexibility with remote work until the internet outage in resolved.

Shared Services Center: Phone lines to the Shared Services Center came back online Aug. 29 and service requests are being received. System availability remains limited so responses may be delayed.

Travel and expense activity: The Concur system is now accessible at Concursolutions.com. Enter your full umich email address, click ‘Next’ and then click ‘Sign in with SSO.’ PCard approvals can be extended for one week. Please note that expense payments are not yet being processed.

If you have internet access, you can book travel through Lightning via the Travel Booking tile on Wolverine Access. Please contact CTP at 877-804-3688 (international 402-252-4404) or by email at umichigan@ctptravelservices.com for additional booking support.

UPDATE: Temporary Internet Outage on All U-M Campuses

To the university community:

Thank you for your continued patience during our ongoing online service disruption. Our team of IT and cybersecurity experts has made significant progress over the past 24 hours. All students, faculty and staff can now authenticate into their U-M accounts and access umich.edu when using off-campus or cellular networks. Off-campus/cellular network access has also been restored to cloud-based services like Google products, Canvas, Adobe Creative Suite, Zoom, Wolverine Access, Dropbox, Slack, Duo, and more.

We also continue to focus on restoring wiFi and internet access. Further announcements will be made on umich.edu and at @umichtech.

Important IT outage update

To the university community:

The loss of internet access and other business functions across the University of Michigan community cast an unfortunate cloud over an otherwise sunny and glorious start to the academic year.

Despite this setback, our campuses were alive Monday with a wide array of activities as students greeted each other, faculty members took their places in classrooms and researchers returned to their labs across our three-campus community.

I want to thank each and every one of you – students, faculty, staff, parents and visitors – for your diligence and your patience as we work to resolve this situation and restore access to online services and, ultimately, full internet access to our campus communities.

Faculty have adjusted their plans for their classrooms to account for the loss of internet access on our campuses.

Staff have seamlessly shifted to working remotely or come to campus to welcome and assist students as they make their way from one side of campus to another.

Our Information and Technology Services teams, working together with leading cybersecurity service providers, are working tirelessly to resolve this disruption and I want to personally thank them for their dedication to this critical effort. Already they have restored an impressive array of online tools that are accessible and functional through off-campus internet connections.

The investigative work into the security issue continues. As noted in Monday’s message to the community, our U-M Division of Public Safety and Security and federal law enforcement partners are involved in this investigation.

While we will continue to share as much information as possible as this work progresses, we are not able to share any information that might compromise the investigation. I appreciate your understanding as we move through the investigative process.

Thank you again for your patience and contributions.

Santa J. Ono
President

Important update on campus IT outage

To the university community:

We recognize that cutting off online services to our campus community on the eve of a new academic year is stressful and a major inconvenience. We sincerely apologize for the disruption this has caused.

Our Information Assurance team, in partnership with leading cybersecurity service providers, detects, deflects, and mitigates a steady stream of malicious actors every hour of every day.

Sunday afternoon, after careful evaluation of a significant security concern, we made the intentional decision to sever our ties to the internet. We took this action to provide our information technology teams the space required to address the issue in the safest possible manner.

The team is working around the clock and already has restored access to some systems. Updates will be available on umich.edu and on @umichtech on Twitter.

That said, it may be several days before all online services return to their normal levels. Here are some important things to know:

• It appears that the impact is not the same across the university or on all campuses. All clinical applications at Michigan Medicine are functional and no patient care has been disrupted.
• Classes are meeting on all three campuses. Faculty members will, to the best of their abilities, communicate directly with students directly regarding any needed adjustments. Please check ro.umich.edu/calendars/schedule-of-classes to view public course schedules and locations.
• Campus leaders recognize that many students rely on U-M systems to access class information and navigate campus, especially on the first day of classes. Consideration will be given to students for impacts to class attendance or assignments that depend on U-M systems while our teams work to restore service.
• Campus remains open. Residence halls, dining facilities, classroom buildings, and all university offices are operational. Individual units are making local decisions about where (on campus or remotely) employees are best able to fulfill their roles.
• In recognition of the challenges faced during this outage, students will not incur late registration or disenrollment fees through the month of August. 
• While many students received an initial disbursement of financial aid funds, financial aid refunds may be delayed due to the system outage.
• While the campus internet (wired and WiFi) is still down, cloud services such as Google, Canvas, Zoom, Adobe Cloud, Dropbox, Slack and other systems are now back online and reachable when using off-campus and cellular networks. Please note that cellular networks are currently under much greater stress than normal.
• Certain campus systems, such as M-Pathways, eResearch, DART, remain unavailable at this time.

The U-M Division of Public Safety and Security and federal law enforcement partners have been informed and are involved.

Again, thank you for your patience. Please know the ITS teams are working tirelessly to resolve this matter as quickly as possible.

Ravi Pendse
Vice President for Information Technology.
Chief Information Officer

Sol Bermann
Chief Information Security Officer
Executive Director of Information Assurance 

Andy Palms
Executive Director, Infrastructure
Information and Technology Services

UPDATE: Temporary Internet Outage on All U-M Campuses

We apologize for the ongoing disruption. On Sunday, the difficult decision was made to separate the U-M network from the internet to help mitigate technical issues. It was not made lightly, particularly given the timing with the first day of classes.

Classes are meeting. Please check ro.umich.edu/calendars/schedule-of-classes to view public course schedules & locations.

We will continue to restore systems and provide updates throughout Monday. We are hopeful we will have several systems back online by Monday afternoon. Updates will be available on umich.edu and on @umichtech on Twitter. We apologize for the inconvenience.

UPDATE: Temporary Internet Outage on All U-M Campuses

While systems currently remain offline, ro.umich.edu/calendars/schedule-of-classes is now live to allow Ann Arbor students to check public course schedules & locations. Classes are meeting today. Our next update will be made at 9:00 am ET. Updates will be available on umich.edu and on @umichtech on Twitter. We, again, apologize for the inconvenience.

UPDATE: Temporary Internet Outage on All U-M Campuses

Thank you for your patience. Teams remain working to restore access to online services. While systems currently remain offline, ro.umich.edu/calendars/schedule-of-classes is now live to allow Ann Arbor students to check public course schedules & locations. Our next update will be made at 9:00 am ET. Updates will be available on umich.edu and on @umichtech on Twitter. We, again, apologize for the inconvenience. 

UPDATE: Temporary Internet Outage on All U-M Campuses

We are making progress but we are still working to resolve ongoing issues with U-M online services. We understand that this has a large impact for the community, and we regret the timing. The next update will be posted by midnight ET.

UPDATE: Temporary Internet Outage on All U-M Campuses

Due to a technology issue, U-M online services remain inaccessible at the moment, including Google, Canvas, Wolverine Access, and email. We are working toward restoration later this evening. The next update will be posted by 9:00 pm ET.

NOTICE: Temporary Internet Outage on All U-M Campuses around 1:45 p.m. on Sunday, August 27

Dear U-M community,

Due to a technology issue, internet connectivity will be intermittent or unavailable on the U-M Ann Arbor, Flint and Dearborn campuses starting around 1:45 pm on Sunday, August 27.

Service will be restored as quickly as possible. Please monitor @umichtech for updates on the outage.

We greatly apologize for the inconvenience.

Thank you.

--
Ravi Pendse PhD
Vice President for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer
University of Michigan
rpendse@umich.edu

Andy Palms
Executive Director, Infrastructure
Information and Technology Services
palms@umich.edu