Email is the most commonly used application in any business, and it is also the most vulnerable application. While spam emails used to be an annoying inconvenience in our work and personal inboxes, emails are now the number one vehicle cybercriminals exploit for their attacks on companies and individuals. 

Ingoing and outgoing emails are a gateway to your data, systems, and networks. At any time, emails coming into your organization and going around from within your organization could be loaded with viruses or malware, ready to harvest, distribute, or destroy critical and sensitive data. Anyone you communicate with, such as internal employees, customers, stakeholders, and the like, are risks for introducing threats to your business or being on the receiving end of a cyber hacker using your company emails as a vehicle for their malicious intents. 

Virus scanners are part of an email security solution. Still, in today’s cybersavvy world, a virus scanner just isn’t enough to fully protect your employees, your company, your customers, and your data. Most mail systems are equipped with built-in virus scanners, but you also need additional support and security through a third-party filter, hosted locally or in the Cloud.

This advanced security layer is a vital component of a comprehensive security approach and can fully protect you against:

• Spam emails
• Viruses & Malware
• Phishing and unsecured emails 
• Data loss, such as credit card numbers or other sensitive information 

Advanced email security measures also provide a full suite of benefits, including: 

• Advanced reporting and statistics
• Flexible data recovery
• Integrated archiving for all emails and instant messages
• Outbound filtering
• Continuous monitoring and prevention of ongoing threats
• Easy-to-manage quarantines and exception lists

Here’s a breakdown of advanced email security solutions and how they can secure your emails and your business. 

Advanced Threat Protection (Spam, Viruses, Malware)

Advanced Threat Protection, or ATP, is the first layer of security. ATP scans email attachments in the most commonly used file formats and compares them against known threats. If a file is unknown, ATP secures the email outside of your network and then open it to observe the behavior of the file. If the email is found to contain malicious content, it is quarantined. 

Anti-Phishing

Sometimes an email arrives in your inbox, and all looks well. But it may not always be what it appears! Anti-Phishing algorithms detect and flag fraudulent emails, which often seem to have been sent by someone you know. Anti-Phishing measures review these emails with anti-fraud intelligence, investigating if the sender is valid and examining links to ensure they are not directing you to a known malicious site.

Data Loss Prevention

In many industries, private information such as social security and credit card numbers are readily available to employees. A policy-based screening can detect if that information is being distributed outside of the organization via emails, and then prevent those emails from being sent.

Secure Emails

As much as you want to protect your private company or employee data, there are times when people inside your organization need to send external users sensitive information. That information may contain individual health or private financial details. Secure Emails help address this issue by inviting recipients to verify their identity to download the contents of the message–rather than including this sensitive data in the actual email itself. 

Message Archiving

Message Archiving provides a complete backup of all internal and external messages. This backup of all employee communication is a comprehensive history that can help you recover from lost data, assist in e-Discovery, and can help you meet regulatory compliance. 

In the long run, better email security can help protect you against malicious messages, data loss, and help you meet compliance requirements. Most organizations have at least some of the security solutions in place, but not all. A comprehensive review with a trusted advisor that can verify what you have in place now, and identify any weaknesses you may have–as well as giving you practical solutions for creating and implementing internal policies and procedures that protect everyone within your organization.

At Concensus, we’ll provide a thorough Cybersecurity review that will give you a clear view of where you are today so you can plan for tomorrow. Please contact our sales team or visit our website to schedule your review at www.concensus.com/healthcheck.  

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