Managing Security > Overview of User and Group Security

There are two levels of security - "Security Groups" and individual users. Security is defined at the group level and then individual users are assigned to security groups. This means that security settings can be defined for groups of users such as administrators, mentors, mentees, and then when an individual user is placed in a group then they inherit the security privileges of that group.

Users can be in multiple groups, in which case they inherit the 'highest' privileges of the combined groups. So, for example, if the administrator group has access to a specific function and the mentor group doesn't, and a user is attached to both groups then the user will have access to this specific function.

The default groups within MentorNet are as follows:

•	Administrator Able to access all parts of the system and view all users.

•	Mentor Able to access all parts of the system apart from administrative functions. Typically able to view general details of all other mentors but only able to view his own mentee.

•	Mentee Able to access all parts of the system apart from administrative functions. Typically only able to view his own mentor and no other mentees.

•	Forum User Able to access only the forum areas and cannot view the details of any non-forum user.

•	Forum Administrator Able to access only the forum areas and cannot view the details of any non-forum user. Can access all administrative areas of the forum, such as creating new forums and sub forums.

The above groups are the default groups in MentorNet, but these can be changed and added to. Administrators are able to define new security groups to suit the requirements of their organisation. For example, some organisations might want multiple levels of administrative access, in which case different administrator groups could be defined with different security privileges.