Ever since the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol was established by Postel in the early 1980s, hackers have been interested in turning email into the ultimate attack surface. SMTP was quickly adopted by the scientific, academic, business, and government sectors as a favorite means of digital communications, and we can safely say that this has not changed much.
Modern email platforms run on advanced protocols based on the original SMTP. Just like back in the 1980s, the number of email users continues to grow steadily, and the sectors with the most substantial usage are still the scientific, academic, government, and business fields. According to projections by the World Wide Web Consortium, the daily volume of email generated around the world will surpass 375 billion messages by 2025.
Hackers have always been more than happy to use email as a primary attack surface. At SynchroNet, our information security analysts have noticed that many of the most damaging ransomware attacks start with email phishing campaigns. Corporate executives are often targeted by fraudulent email messages, and the same can be said about payroll accountants, human resources managers, and even security guards.
Email can be used to drop Trojan horse attacks, insert malicious code, trick users into opening attachments that trigger code execution, or redirect users to websites where JavaScript malware resides. To a great extent, these issues can be prevented with email server firewalls as well as malware scanning solutions that evaluate messages before they are opened. These are fairly standard email security measures.
It is important to note that email security by itself does not offer full protection to business owners these days. Email security must be complemented with email safety, and this is something that can only be achieved with proper training and reasonable email handling policies. Staff members must be made aware of the cyber threats they face as business email users. To this effect, they need to be mindful of safety standards such as never sending passwords through email messages, identifying suspicious phishing activity, flagging spam that somehow got through the junk mail filters, and many others.
Seasoned technicians at SynchroNet can tell you that setting up email security systems is not an overly complicated process. Implementing an email safety system at the office, on the other hand, is something that requires careful planning, organization, training, writing workplace policies, monitoring, and enforcement.
SynchroNet can help you with both email security and email safety. Our technology consulting team can draft an effective plan to enact email handling policies, provide training, and monitor proper adherence to safety measures.
