Anonymous reporting system
An anonymous reporting system for use in reporting and following up on incidents, accidents, and the like. The system may be accessed via an Internet website. A reporting individual may select a type of incident to report. In one example, the reporting individual may select a level on anonymity and some, none or all of the individual's personal identification is displayed to the organization according to the selected level.
1. A computer-implemented method of providing a reporting system for an exchange of incident information between a reporting party and an organization, comprising:
receiving, via an administration computing device, a designation of authorized users from the organization;
receiving, via the administration computing device, an assignment of a first set of the authorized users to a first notification level and a second set of the authorized users to a second notification level, wherein the assignment is specified by the organization;
receiving, via a reporting party computing device, an incident report from the reporting party, the incident report comprising: a type of report, an anonymity level of the reporting party, and incident information;
wherein the incident information comprises a description of the incident and a name of one or more subject persons involved in the incident;
storing the incident report in a database;
assigning the incident report to the first notification level or the second notification level based on each of the type of report and the anonymity level of the reporting party;
in accordance with the incident report being assigned to the first notification level, transmitting, by the administration computing device, a notification of the incident report to the first set of authorized users;
in accordance with the incident report being assigned to the second notification level, transmitting, by the administration computing device, the notification of the incident report to the second set of authorized users.
2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein:
the incident report identifies the reporting party that initiated the incident report; and
a status is transmitted to the reporting party in response to the notification of the incident report being transmitted to either the first or second set of authorized users.
3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein:
the notification of the incident report is not transmitted to the one or more subject persons.
4. The computer-implemented method of claim 3 , further comprising if the incident report is assigned to the first notification level:
providing authorized access to the incident report to the first set of authorized users; and
denying authorized access to the incident report to the one or more subject persons.
5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the transmitting the notification comprises transmitting an email message having a link to the incident report.
6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising storing in the database a log of the notification.
7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the anonymity level comprises one of:
remain completely anonymous;
remain anonymous to the organization; and
do not care about anonymity.
8. The computer-implemented method of claim 7 , wherein if the anonymity level is do not care about anonymity, the incident report includes a name of the reporting party and contact information for the reporting party.
9. The computer-implemented method of claim 7 , wherein if the anonymity level is remain completely anonymous, information regarding the reporting party is not stored in the database.
10. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the database is a relational database.
11. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising:
in accordance with the incident report being assigned to the first notification level:
providing authorized access to the incident report to the first set of authorized users; and
denying authorized access to the incident report to the second set of authorized users.
12. An incident reporting and management system, comprising:
a database system comprising non-transitory, tangible computer readable storage medium, encoded with processor readable instructions;
a device operating a report intake portal;
an organization portal; and
a web server system comprising non-transitory, tangible computer readable storage medium, encoded with processor readable instructions, the web server system comprising:
a list of authorized users stored on the database system, wherein,
each authorized user is assigned a notification level and a role, and
the list of authorized users and the notification level are received from the organization portal;
an incident report received from a reporting party via the report intake portal and stored in the database system, the incident report comprising: a type of report, information about an incident, and a name of a subject person to whom the incident pertains;
a list of report recipients generated from the list of authorized users, the list of report recipients based on the type of report, the notification level of each authorized user, and the role of each authorized user; and
a notification of the incident report, the incident report notification transmitted via the web server system to users associated with the list of report recipients, and if the subject person is on the list of report recipients, the subject person is excluded from receiving the notification of the incident report.
13. The system of claim 12 , wherein the application server further comprises a level of anonymity associated with the incident report, wherein the level of anonymity is received from the report intake portal.
14. The system of claim 13 , wherein the level of anonymity comprises one of:
remain completely anonymous;
remain anonymous to an organization; and
do not care about anonymity.
15. The system of claim 12 , wherein the report intake portal is configured for use with an Internet browser.
16. The system of claim 15 , wherein the Internet browser is facilitated using a secure website having data encryption configured for encrypting confidential data transmitted using the Internet browser.
17. The system of claim 12 , wherein the incident information includes confidential data.
18. The system of claim 13 , wherein,
the application server further comprises contact information of a reporting party,
the contact information is stored in the database system; and
access to the contact information is denied to the list of authorized users.
19. The system of claim 18 , wherein the contact information is further stored in the incident report in response to receiving a do not care the level of anonymity.
20. The system of claim 12 , comprising an incident report grant access, wherein the incident report grant access is provided to the users associated with the list of report recipients.
21. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the type of report is selected from a list comprising at least each of:
a fraud report;
a sexual harassment report; and
a theft report.