E-learner's handbook

Data protection

Data protection rules have been put in place so that the data of none of us is used in a way that makes us feel bad, uncomfortable or harmed.

Which data is personal data that must be protected and why? Personal data is any data concerning an identified or identifiable natural person, revealing the person’s physical, mental, physiological, economic, cultural or social properties, relationships and affiliations. For instance, the person’s name and surname, personal identification code, date of birth, origin, citizenship and contact details, data about the person’s education, studies and work experience, financial data, such as the bank account number, data about family members and military service, etc. This means that also the study results (scores, assessments) are student’s personal data. Apart from the student, the lecturer or other university staff may disclose study results only to these university members who need them for their work. Personal data may be disclosed to other persons, including other students, only with the data subject’s consent or if required by law.

Access to most environments related to e-learning at the university requires an account of the UT computer network (UT students or employees) or an automatically created account (continuing education learners) and agreeing to the terms and conditions. These environments can only be used via a personal user account that allows identification. The user’s name and surname, email address, ID number in the university’s register, and the personal ID code (for foreign citizens, a code generated based on the user’s surname and date of birth) are transferred from the university’s central database to Moodle.

The university processes students’ personal data in several e-learning environments: Moodle, Mahara, Panopto, LimeSurvey. The student does not have to submit any additional data to use these environments, as they will be transferred automatically from the SIS. Users of e-learning environments may complete their user profile with voluntary information (for example, a photo, city, interests), which help to improve the usability of the e-learning environment. The legal basis for processing this data is the user’s consent. The user has the right to edit or delete this data at any time, except for the name and surname, username and email address. The university processes personal data only to allow the creating of user accounts and to ensure the delivery of teaching activities according to the university’s data protection policy, to offer user support, analyse the use of the environment and increase usability.

Without the learner’s written consent, the lecturer does not have the right to disclose or disseminate the learner’s personal data (incl. scores, percentages and grades; personal email addresses, etc.) to other persons (incl. other learners). Publishing study results along with the person’s name, personal ID code or matriculation number is not acceptable, either.

The university discloses personal data only to the administrators of the environment, to persons in the lecturer’s role who see the personal data of learners participating in their course, and to other persons if the requirement of disclosure arises from the law. The lecturer sees the name and surname of learners participating in the course, their user names, email addresses and activity logs (incl. IP addresses). In the grading table of the online course, learners see only their own study results and private feedback. Public feedback given to learners in the forum is part of the teaching process and aims to support learning.

All e-learning environments of the UT use web-browser cookies: e.g. the session cookie that manages logins, Google Analytics’ cookies that collect data about users’ sessions and activities, cookies for storing language settings and usernames, etc. When you log out from the environment or close the web browser, the session cookie is automatically deleted from the browser and the server. Google Analytics’ data is stored for two years. These environments cannot be used without allowing some of the cookies. By agreeing to the terms and conditions, you agree to the use of cookies.

To protect your data, do not enter your data in suspicious forms; use a password that includes upper- and lowercase letters, special characters and numbers and is long enough; do not disclose your user account data to anyone else and do not save them on anyone else’s computer.

Where can I get help?

In all questions regarding the processing of personal data, feel free to contact the UT senior specialist of data protection by email (terje.maesalu@ut.ee) or, if you need a consultation, by phone at 5542466.

Additional reading

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