Service Description
Slack is a messaging app that connects people and information through the use of searchable chat rooms, called channels, that can be organized by topic, team, or other attributes. When teams work together in channels, information can be shared with everyone at once, helping teams stay aligned and make decisions more quickly. Channels can be public (i.e., open to everyone in your U-M Slack workspace) or private (i.e., limited to specific individuals or teams). Slack also allows participants to send direct messages to others within and across each U-M Slack workspace.
Which campuses is it available to?
U-M Slack is available to all active faculty, staff, students, and Type 1 sponsored affiliates on the Ann Arbor, Dearborn, and Flint campuses and Michigan Medicine.
Compliance
Slack is a secure U-M contracted-for cloud service that can be used to maintain or share some types of sensitive university data. Because anyone at U-M can join public channels, these are not appropriate for sharing sensitive data.
Sensitive data may only be shared in private channels or via direct messages, not in public channels. Protected health information (PHI, regulated by HIPAA) cannot be used in U-M Slack, even in private channels.