Can the system administrator view all content?

Data, media, and content privacy is incredibly important. It is a complex subject, but for the focus of this FAQ, there are two areas to consider:

1. Access to content within the site by users and visitors.
2. Access to content through the server or hosting environment itself.

Access to content within the site

For all authenticated site users and visitors, access to content is fully controlled by the site's cultural protocols. Please refer to the documentation on cultural protocols and user roles for more detail. The only exception to this are users with the role "Administrator". This role is typically only given to one or two users per site and is a necessary role for at least one user to have on a respective Mukurtu site.

Users with the "Administrator" role do bypass cultural protocols when using the site and can access all site content, media, etc.

• This is effectively unavoidable due to the nature of the technologies used.
• That said, it is also necessary for someone to have this kind of access. When doing certain troubleshooting and maintenance tasks, it is necessary to have access to both the system tools and content access permissions which most user accounts wouldn't have.
• Additionally, a user with this role serves as a backup if a community manager or protocol steward leaves the project or locks themselves out of their account (assuming there are no other users who are active managers or stewards within their communities and protocols). Someone else needs to be able to access and manage those groups - either to restore access or assign new managers and stewards.
• This is one of the reasons that we strongly recommend using a "Mukurtu manager" account for most day-to-day work, and reserving the Administrator account for troubleshooting, maintenance, and other necessary tasks that can be done with a "Administrator" account as needed.
• By default, the user account that is created at the time the site is installed will have the "Administrator" role. Other users must be manually assigned this role.

Access to content through the server or hosting environment

Someone with access to the server or hosting environment directly would also have access to the contents of the database (media, content, etc.).

• Similar to the notes above, that is simply the nature of this kind of technology. In order to properly implement and maintain complex systems, a server/system administrator will have root level access.
• This is a clear reason why it's important to work with a trusted IT department or third party vendor for hosting. On a technical level they should be managing security on their systems to ensure that no unauthorized person can access the databases. On a policy level you should ensure that your agreements and contracts require your hosting provider to respect your expectations and needs for access and control.