Banner Self Service and PIN Requests

If you are trying to access Banner Self Service within Genesis (i.e. "My Banner") you may get asked for a Username and PIN.

There are no PINs used to access any Genesee service and, if you are asked for one, there is a problem that needs to be resolved.

If youa re asked for a PIN, this indicates to the college that there most likely is a Firewall between your computer and the college computers. This may be a personal firewall on your computer or it may be a business/corporate firewall at your place of employment.

First thing to do is to check. Run the Browser Check (opens a new window) to see what version of the browser you are using, if you have cookies set and to see if it can detect a firewall. This does not detect 100% of the firewalls but is a good first step in attempting to resolve the problem.

Personal Firewalls

If you have a firewall on your home computer, either as a result of the Operating System or as a result of security software (such as Norton Internet Security or ZoneAlarm), you have two basic options:

• turn off the firewall completely
• manage the firewall to allow access to Genesee resources

You may want to turn off the firewall temporarily as a test to determine if that is the problem. If after turning off the firewall (and you may have more than one firewall!), the request for a username and pin does not appear, that identifies the problem.

If have a firewall you do not want to turn off permanantly and/or you chose to manage your firewall, you need to allow access to all *.genesee.edu web sites through all ports. Some of the resources managed by Genesee use non-standard ports and you need to allow that traffic to all ports through the firewall.

You do need to manage your own firewall software. There are too many different firewall and security software options for the college to be familiar with them and you will need to either consult the documentation, contact the vendor or get outside assistance if you cannot manage the firewall on your own.

Corporate/Business Firewalls

Many businesses have their own firewalls for their own security purposes. You may not have access to change those settings or have input to the allowed exceptions for these firewalls and, if this is the case, you simply may not be able to access Banner Self Service from that work location.

Many K-12 school districts have firewalls that will not allow you to access Banner Self Service from that location. The college is aware, for example, that users who try to access Banner Self Service from most BOCES locations cannot do so due to the settings in the BOCES firewall software.

Getting Help

If you have determined that you have no firewalls and have run the Browser Check and you still get a request for a username and pin, you will be asked to try to access Banner Self Service from another physical location.

At this point, a Help Desk staff person may work with you to test your access to Banner Self Service from a college computer. If we find that the access to Banner Self Service works on campus (that is, access from a campus computer does not result in a request for a username and pin), then there is still a firewall somewhere in your environment that either you do not know about or you do not have access to.