Hosted Email Security Solutions

Hosted email security is typically a cloud-based email filtering service provided by an established online security firm.

The reason why many companies opt for a hosted email security software is to take advantage of its advanced features in order to improve spam detection rates and limit the number of phishing emails entering the network, as well as those that include malware and ransomware.

Cloud-based email filtering services are low maintenance options, with software updates being conducted by the company providing the service. They also have the advantages of being universally compatible with all operating systems, infinitely scalable and cost-effective – requiring no hardware investment or software installations, and being supported by the service provider´s technical department.

To better safeguard their networks against spam email, businesses create an account with a service provider, add their domain and a domain administrator, and then link up with the service provider´s servers by redirecting their MX records. Thereafter, all inbound emails pass through the service supplier’s servers, and are filtered according to policies created by the domain manager.

User policies can be imported from existing directory tools or created and amended as necessary. Domain administrators can apply different acceptable spam thresholds by user, group, domain or company-wide via a centralized management portal (a default threshold is applied until this is done), and schedule reports to be shared with each user when email is quarantined by the hosted email security software.

Thereafter, domain administrators can easily track the amount of spam emails being detected, tagged, quarantined and rejected in real time via the management portal or historically via a suite of customizable reports. These reports can help groups reviewing their online security and compiling risk assessments if the business operates within a regulated sector.

Not all hosted email security software is identical. Although most use Real Time Blacklists and SURBL filters to prevent emails from known sources of spam, those with higher spam detection rates use a process known as greylisting to help recognize emails from previously unknown sources of spam. Greylisting can delay the sending of emails to users, but the benefits can be substantial.

Research has displayed that the average spam detection rate for the top ten email filtering services without greylisting is 96.86%. Even with this high spam detection rate, an office-based staff will be sent an average of twelve spam emails per day. By comparison, hosted email security software with greylisting recognizes 99% of spam emails – reducing the number of spam emails were sent a daily average of four.

The time invested by a single office-based employee identifying and removing eight spam emails per day may not be very long. But, multiply that time by thousands of staff members, and over the course of a year a company can save tens of thousands of dollars in lost productivity as well as reduce the number of potential dangers entering the mail network by 67% – usually for no additional expense.