Important: Groupcall Security Notice

[vikpaw]

Yup. Classroom Monitor confirmed that they are migrating everyone from GroupCall Xporter over to Wonde.

 

Interesting, I wonder if, as a school, you get a choice in the matter. - Some concerns have been raised about them.

How would this work, in terms of letting schools know and managing the change? As a school I would want seamless handover, but also to be sure the old system was properly terminated.

[GREED]

How would this work, in terms of letting schools know and managing the change? As a school I would want seamless handover, but also to be sure the old system was properly terminated.

 

Choice is good, we have seen Xporter and other data extraction technologies work fine side by side - though the performance and timings of extracts are a thing to think about. Xporter, and I am sure others that work much the same, manages all the data extracts (jobs) so they are efficiently working with each other, and also not all trying to grab the same or all data at the same time. Different systems will not interact like that, but to be honest some clever scheduling will sort that no problem. Can easily see a near future with several data extraction apps working side by side, perfectly fine.

 

In Xporter, you can just shut that job off in the console, or if nothing is using Xporter any more, just remove the application - simple!

 

A bigger concern is about the data each is extracting, and how. Xporter's efficiency works by looking at all the jobs needed, combining the data fields into one extract, pulling that, then sorting it all out on the server after, so each data stream only gets what it is authorised to have. We do NOT pull everything up to the cloud then farm the data out to whoever wants/needs it.

Edited June 22, 2017 by GREED

[localzuk]

Interesting, I wonder if, as a school, you get a choice in the matter. - Some concerns have been raised about them.

 

Our choice is with that supplier. We don't like that they use a third party for something, then we don't buy into that service.

 

How would this work, in terms of letting schools know and managing the change? As a school I would want seamless handover, but also to be sure the old system was properly terminated.

In this case, Wonde are doing all the legwork (which appears to be the way they operate, as they did all the work for Epraise for another of our schools too).

 

They have been more than clear with us about their policies, and how they operate. Nothing jumped out at me as being alarming - we are ultimately the ones in control of what data Wonde can get hold of, via SIMS permissions, and if we want to revoke access completely, just disable the account in SIMS. Their data protection policy is clear and simple, as is their privacy policy.

Edited June 22, 2017 by localzuk

[vikpaw]

@localzuk - that must be the new model then, because the old model required granting access to all data, so effectively moving it all to the perimeter so it was ready for another third party to access regardless of whether you had someone that needed it yet or not. That was how it was explained to me anyway. This is fine for people that understand their MIS and have in-house support to manage it.

[localzuk]

@localzuk - that must be the new model then, because the old model required granting access to all data, so effectively moving it all to the perimeter so it was ready for another third party to access regardless of whether you had someone that needed it yet or not. That was how it was explained to me anyway. This is fine for people that understand their MIS and have in-house support to manage it.

That's always been the case though, with any and all integration tools. We have control, as we control the user accounts they use to access that data. Don't want it pulling personnel data? Don't give it those permissions. Regardless of the instructions given by the third party.

 

If no-one needs that data, it'll never be an issue.

[vikpaw]

That's because we (you and I, and most on here too) know what we're doing. They were and have been asking for access to all data, so that it could be given to a third party supplier - totally different ball game.

I'm assuming this is the reason for @synaesthesia's apprehension and those of others expressed here: http://www.edugeek.net/forums/mis-systems/180268-wonde-gcsepod.html#post1556680 and onwards.

 

I prefer the new model which is only pull out the bits that are required. If you take the old model and couple it with the potential that they* (hypothetically - *not saying it's them) just go in and replace Groupcall without proper notification as per the warning thread then it's a worrying situation.

 

Regardless of the suppliers involved, any school that allows changes to be made to their system without proper verification or oversight is also likely to just allow the default requested permissions and this is dangerous.

[Love_Sausage]

Another of our suppliers are testing out Wonde, we're piloting it for them - Wonde were really unclear who they were when they called for the setup process, to the point where I had to interrogate them until they gave me their name and the name of the product we use. They only had a list of all the products of that vendor, and at first said didn't say who they were, they were just calling on our supplier's behalf. I understand them providing a service that looks to the end user as if it's part of the product you're using, but if they speak to anyone who's clued up - and they should be speaking to someone who's clued up to provide the access they need - they need to be clearer. I fed this back to our supplier.

 

They were also taken aback when I wouldn't let them install their software without going through Data protection and policy checks first.

[SimonCygnetIT]

We have also had schools starting to purchased products that use Wonde but we do things a bit differently. The schools buy the product and then Wonde contacts the school. The schools then contact us to make us aware of what they are buying and that Wonde is needed. I then contact the Wonde engineer and I then either obtain the license keys and do the install myself or get them remoted on to a machine where I can watch every step.

 

To be honest I have found the guys at Wonde quite friendly and amicable and they have data agreements which the schools then have to agree to after the product is installed. I have done one install myself and it was very straight forward. Yes their exporter tool doesn't look great (looks like a very bland and basic Windows application) but it is easy to set up and get working. I have spoken with 2 different engineers at Wonde and both came across as technically capable. Any future installs of Wonde I will probably do myself.

Edited June 26, 2017 by SimonCygnetIT

[GrumbleDook]

First thing, if a company is changing a sub-processor then you need to be informed about this.

 

Second, there should be clear comms about who is doing what work with any of your data.

 

Finally, if *any* company contacts you to say that they are replacing x with y and they are *not* the company you have the contract with then you should do *nothing* until you get written confirmation (including electronic confirmation) that this is what has changed.

[vikpaw]

I would prefer schools to see and agree data agreements prior to any installations.