HiSoftware Advances Solutions and Services to Manage Section 208 Privacy Compliance for Federal Government Agencies

Concord, NH —December 12, 2003-HiSoftware, Inc., the leader in enterprise content quality management solutions, announced today that it has extended it Commercial Off-the Shelf (“COTS”) software solutions. AccVerify and AccMonitor Server provide integrated and automated testing for Federal Agencies to measure their compliance with Section 208 of the E-Government Act as well as global governmental and regulatory privacy legislation. The expanded privacy test suites, complimented by enhanced professional services offerings, will assist customers with identifying and managing online privacy and risk issues to ensure legislative and industry compliance.

Section 208 Privacy Standards of the E-Government Act lay out rules and guidelines agencies must follow to protect the privacy of citizens using government Web sites. This act requires agencies to take specific measures to assure protection of Personally Identifiable Information of citizens. It further incorporates requirements governing the collection, use, retention, and distribution of personal information.

In September of 2003, the Office of Management and Budget issued guidance for implementing Section 208. In part, that guidance requires agencies to 1) Conduct privacy impact assessments for electronic information systems and collections and make them publicly available, 2) Post privacy policies on agency websites used by the public, 3) Translate privacy policies into a standardized machine-readable format (Platform for Privacy Preferences Project (P3P), a standardized machine-readable format) and 4) Submit an annual report on compliance with this guidance to OMB as part of their annual E-Government Act status report. The first reports are due to OMB by December 15, 2003.
(See: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/memoranda/m03-22.html...)

HiSoftware’s validation and monitoring solutions enable Chief Information Officers, Privacy Officers or Web site auditors to confidently analyze Web site content for privacy, quality and accessibility issues. These solutions help customers manage potential privacy risks by identifying information collection, privacy policy linking, user tracking, and more. They provide flexible, automated monitoring capabilities to address new regulatory compliance challenges.

As part of the expansion of its solution set, HiSoftware has released a no-cost P3P builder to assist agencies in meeting their Section 208 compliance objectives. “The HiSoftware P3P Builder is intended to make creating and deploying P3P Policy Files easy, regardless of the skill of the developer,” said Robert B. Yonaitis, President and CEO, HiSoftware Company “It is designed for creating policy files from a wizard/form based approach. No knowledge of XML or P3P File structure is required.”

HiSoftware’s end-to-end software solutions enable customers to proactively manage online privacy. HiSoftware solutions allow users to monitor Web sites for data collection, security and sharing practices, opt-in and opt-out choices, broken links, missing privacy policies, third party linking, P3P and the use of tracking technologies. In addition, HiSoftware Services Professionals work with customers to perform Risk Management and Privacy Impact Assessments, which can be provided to OMB, providing actionable reports that provide a high-level of insight into the degree of organizational compliance.

“Our customer’s have identified Online Privacy Testing as an increasingly mission-critical activity”, said Mr. Yonaitis. “Strengthening the breadth and depth of Web Site content quality testing by integrating interaction and functional test automation, our new Interaction Builder allows enterprise Government agencies to create different types of test automation, including record and playback of macros or scripts. This provides agencies with a superior test management system for privacy and content quality testing of e-commerce Web applications. This includes online reservation systems, e-learning systems and any Web Site or Web based application that require input from a user to negotiate the application.”

HiSoftware solutions allow for automated, scheduled and on demand monitoring of multiple web sites, for online privacy issues, web quality and accessibility factors. They assist IT managers and Web managers in monitoring the structural integrity of their enterprise Web sites. Business decision makers can monitor competitor sites for Trademark infringement and Brand Management violations, in real time. They assist with quality and accessibility assurance by scanning and analyzing web content for broken links, slow loading pages, changing content, and Web site down time. Detailed reports help developers and quality assurance professionals pinpoint and fix content, interaction, and usability defects. These reports provide critical e-business intelligence to Web Managers concerned with online privacy and brand management issues across their Web sites.


ABOUT HISOFTWARE
HiSoftware Company, the leader in enterprise content quality management solutions, provides innovative products that empower quality assurance teams, content developers, Web site architects, and company executives to work collaboratively on their efforts to create and manage corporate Web standards for Accessibility, Privacy, Searchability, Usability and custom guidelines and policies. HiSoftware’s integrated, full lifecycle solutions dramatically reduce the time required to test, manage and deploy e-business Web sites.

HiSoftware works closely with industry leaders and visionaries to provide solutions for today's information accessibility, content quality, search and retrieval needs. HiSoftware’s customers represent Fortune 500 companies, and many of the largest e-commerce, government, and educational sites in North America and around the world and include ChevronTexaco, Commerce One, Mercury Interactive, and Microsoft Government.

Founded in 1998, HiSoftware Company maintains North American corporate headquarters in Concord, New Hampshire. Further information about HiSoftware can be found online at www.hisoftware.com

Learn more about Compliance with Section 208 Privacy Standards of the E-Government Act: and HiSoftware’s privacy management solutions and services at an upcoming HiSoftware Company Web Cast, December 17, 2003 2PM EST. More information about this Web Cast is available on the HiSoftware Web site at: http://www.hisoftware.com/events/208privacy.html

Registration for this event is available online at: http://www.hisoftware.com/events/sitequalsemreg.htm

Learn more about testing interactive Web Applications with HiSoftware’s AccVerify and the Interaction Builder at an upcoming HiSoftware Company Web Cast, January 7, 2004 2PM EST. More information about this Web Cast is available on the HiSoftware Web site at: http://www.hisoftware.com/events/interactions.html

Registration for this event is available online at: http://www.hisoftware.com/events/ibuildermreg.htm
 

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