Cyber-attacks have become a significant threat to business operations. According to the Cisco security report, phishing leads to 90% of data breaches. Phishing involves using malicious links in fraudulent emails or websites to access valuable data.
Using unencrypted and unprotected Office 365 or G Suite can increase vulnerability. Human mistake is a significant contributor to data breaches. Despite having a modern technology suite in IT security, it is challenging to control human error. It isn’t easy to prevent an employer from clicking a link that looks perfectly genuine yet fraudulent.
About 70% of businesses acknowledge the severity of the risk posed by cyber threats. As a result, more than half of organizations are increasing their cybersecurity spending in 2022. Addressing email security and training employees on security issues can solve most cases.
A secure email authentication platform can protect business emails and network assets from phishing and spoofing. It can cushion you from phishing attacks. In this article, you’ll learn about email authentication platforms and their benefits to your business in 2022.
What Is Email Authentication
Email authentication is a security process that provides verifiable proof that an email is from the original and authorized domain sender and not a fraud. It will check all messages and validate the domain ownership to send or change the messages.
The DMARC (domain-based message authentication, reporting, and conformance) comes in handy. It is an email authentication method that prevents domain name spoofing. As a result, it can prevent attackers from using the brand in their spoofing and phishing attacks.
Hackers can ruin your brand’s trust and scare away your customers. A secure email authentication platform can also reinforce your security and protect your brand’s trust.
An intuitive and simplified DMARC solution makes it easy to tailor the solution to your email security needs. Valimail, the leading DMARC solution provider today, can come in handy and automate the solution to meet your enforcement standards. Customers’ data security should be a top priority to reinforce your customers’ brand trust.
Benefits of Email Authentication Platform for Your Business
1. Maintain Compliance and Avoid Business Risks
Different data regulations are applicable to almost every region or country. For example, EU GDPR applies to the EU region or if you handle EU citizen data even outside the EU. In short, it is applicable worldwide.
As for the US, it mainly concerns HIPAA data. It is majorly applicable to healthcare organizations and their contractors handling patient health information in the US. Any data breach risks may lead to flouting some data security regulations.
Breaching client data of EU citizens will expose you to fines of as much as €20 million or 4% of your annual turnover. That is a hefty fine that takes away a big chunk of your bottom line. Besides, business emails can contain vital strategic and confidential information like IP. Hackers can facilitate corporate espionage, and rivals can gain leverage over you in the market.
It is cheaper to comply and protect your trade secrets. Having an email authentication platform is a substantial effort toward reducing your exposure to such risks. It will encrypt all your business email communication. Only a recipient with the right key can read the contents of email communication.
The encryption can be applied to various communication levels. You can implement it on the message, while sending emails, or across the whole company communication. Based on your market niche and industry regulation, you can adopt the relevant email security policy to be compliant.
2. Secure Confidential Information
An encrypted email communication improves the security of your email communication. It prevents your confidential messages from being intercepted and sold to third parties.
Email security has three features that collectively ensure your email communication remains confidential:
- Authentication: The process of verifying an email sender’s identity.
- Privacy: It ensures only the receiver gets the message.
- Integrity: It gives assurance to the receiver that the received message has not been modified from the original.
Hence, your email communication confidentiality is assured.
3. Reduce Risks Linked to Email Replies
Some can easily modify the email you’ve sent. It can also be stored, changed, and re-sent later. A person can get an authentic email now and later receive a fake one that completely resembles an official one.
It may be hard for the recipient to differentiate between the authentic message and the altered one. For example, many PayPal accounts have been targeted with spoofed emails threatening them that their accounts are about to be suspended. In the long run, they defraud the unknowing scammers only to realize it is not the official message from the PayPal domain.
Email authentication platforms offer timestamps and access restrictions for a specific duration with an expiry deadline. It also includes the platform’s use of one-time-use passwords and ransom session keys.
These provide an extra layer of security on their multi-factor authentication. Hence, you have encryption and additional security features to prevent the risk of message reply and spoofing.
4. Cost-Effective
Cyber attacks are causing massive losses, and companies are putting more effort into combating them. Although expensive, a customized DMARC solution makes email safer, thus preventing phishing attacks that contribute to about 90% of data breaches.
For example, Valimail DMARC SaaS solution is a free version and relatively priced paid plans tailored to your needs. On the other hand, Protonmail only charges $4 per user per month. In short, you can have email encryption with anti-spoofing abilities cheaply.
Take Away
A significant data breach that costs millions or billions is contributed by email or website phishing. Weak email security policies can also enable hackers to spoof your domain, harming your brand trust in the process.
Customers must trust your brand with their data. Any mistrust or bad reputation handling data or breaches may make them consider a more secure rival. Email authentication platforms can encrypt and secure your email communications. You can get the above benefits and build stronger brand trust and reputation.