Glossary definition: Email Security

Email Security: Protecting Your Inbox

Email security is the practice of protecting email messages and accounts from unauthorized access, malicious software, and harmful content. It involves a variety of measures to prevent the interception, alteration, or misuse of email messages. These measures include encryption, authentication, digital signatures, and secure email gateways. Encryption scrambles email messages so that only the intended recipient can read them. Authentication verifies the identity of the sender and recipient of an email message. Digital signatures are used to authenticate the sender of an email and verify that the message has not been altered in transit. Secure email gateways filter out malicious content and protect the email server from malicious attacks. Additionally, email security practices involve the use of strong passwords and two-factor authentication to protect email accounts from unauthorized access.