An important aspect to email security is, of course, deploying a good email security solution. But, with so many available in the market, what should you be looking for when opting for an email security tool? Here are some key features you would want in your email security solution.

• Think CIA: Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability.
  • Confidentiality: Who is allowed and not allowed to see your information.
  • Integrity:  Ensure the person or system that should be accessing and changing information is the one doing it.
  • Availability:  Your information is there when and where you need it.
• Encryption: Let’s start with the worst-case scenario. Your corporate email server is hacked. By opting for an email security solution that offers data encryption, you can ensure that the thieves are never able to read the data they stole. Data encryption is basically coding of data in a different format when it is sent and decoding it once it reaches the recipient. Without decryption keys, no one in the middle will be able to make sense of the data they access.
• Ditch the server-based email system: In server based email systems–the kind supported by most older versions of email software (Outlook, Thunderbird, etc), the emails are stored on servers and transmitted every time the email software establishes connection with them.The newer, web-based systems offer additional security.
• Strong filters: Make sure your email security tool has strong filtering capabilities to keep spam and malicious emails out of your inbox. Training employees to identify spam and fraudulent emails is good, but getting an email security software that keeps most of them away is even better!
• Intelligence: When looking for an email security software, consider its artificial intelligence. According to Biztech, a leading business technology news magazine, newer anti-malware rely less on signatures of known malicious content and instead uses threat intelligence, reputation services and other near-real-time sources to pinpoint the location of threats — domains and IP and email addresses, for example to alert IT teams. Cybercriminals are getting smarter by the day, and always innovating, looking for ways to get around the anti-malwares existing in the market. You need an email security solution that can keep up with them.

Below are some security facts to keep in mind when thinking about an email system for your business:

• A security breach (a violation of your CIA policies) is much more likely to come from within your organization – either by accident or intention.
• Nearly 60 percent of employees who quit a job or are asked to leave will steal company information (source – Washington Post)
• Most likely causes of data loss:  human error – 26%, computer viruses – 4%, natural disasters – 2%, hardware or system problem – 56%, software corruption or bug – 9% (source – OnTrack).
• Internet misuse in the workplace costs American corporations more than $178 billion annually in lost productivity. This translates into a loss of more than $5,000 per employee per year (source – Websense).
• Hackers (crackers) are most likely trying to steal basic personal identity details and/or your computing resources – EVERYONE IS A TARGET.

The critical role played by email in your business environment and its vulnerability make it imperative that you deploy strong security solutions for your email. Reach out to Tobin Solutions to learn more about how you can keep your email system clean and safe.