Securing Your Emails: Understanding the Role of Email Security Protocols in Deliverability

September 23, 2023
minutes
Securing Your Emails: Understanding the Role of Email Security Protocols in Deliverability

In today's digital age, how we communicate has dramatically shifted. One of the ways we continue to use is email. However, with this convenience comes significant responsibility: ensuring email security and deliverability. Email security is not just a matter of protecting your information from unauthorized access - it plays a crucial role in whether your message will reach its destination. 

Think of email security protocols as digital bodyguards for your emails. These guards ensure the safety and integrity of your messages through the web. They are a barrier between your message and potential threats - such as scams, identity theft, impersonation... 

We will discuss the importance of email security protocols and their role in email deliverability. It is not only important for businesses but for individuals as well to have this bodyguard to keep their personal or business data secure and to ensure the deliverability of emails. 

Understanding Email Security Protocols 

Email security protocols are essentially a set of rules that enable the secure transit of messages over the internet. These protocols function much like digital stamps of approval, assuring that a message is genuine and hasn't been meddled with while on its journey through the internet. Their main job is to shield your data from prying eyes and guarantee that your email successfully lands in the intended inbox. 

Many protocols are working to secure email, each playing a unique part in this process. Here's an overview of the most common ones: 

SPF (Sender Policy Framework): This protocol helps prevent spammers' unauthorized use of your domain. SPF checks if the sender's IP address is on your domain list of permitted sources. 

DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail): DKIM adds a digital signature to your email that verifies that the message was sent from your domain and has not been changed during transport. 

DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance): DMARC uses SPF and DKIM to verify messages' authenticity and provides feedback on how recipients treat emails that fail these checks. 

BIMI (Brand Indicators for Message Identification): BIMI allows brands to display their logo alongside their emails, enhancing recognition and trust among recipients. 

SSL/TLS (Secure Sockets Layer/Transport Layer Security): These protocols encrypt data during transit, preventing unauthorized access. 

SMTPS (Secure SMTP): This version of the SMTP protocol uses encryption for secure email transmission.

STARTTLS: This protocol enables an upgrade from a plain, unencrypted connection to a secure one. 

MTA-STS (Mail Transfer Agent Strict Transport Security): MTA-STS helps protect against "man-in-the-middle" attacks by enforcing an encrypted connection between mail servers. 

These protocols are key tools for maintaining the integrity and security of your email. Using them ensures your email reaches its destination and your data and reputation stay protected.

The Importance of Email Security for Deliverability

Email security protocols play a crucial role in determining whether your email will successfully reach its destination, that is, the recipient's mailbox - or it will end up in spam or even be completely blocked. 

When you send an email, the servers receiving it perform a series of checks to verify its legitimacy. Is it sent from an authorized domain? Has it been altered during transport? Does the domain from which it was sent have a good reputation? Servers look for answers to these questions and email security protocols are the tools that enable getting those answers. 

Attacks like Man-in-the-Middle and eavesdropping pose a serious threat to email security. In Man-in-the-Middle attacks, a hacker inserts themselves into communication between two parties and can intercept, modify, or steal information. Eavesdropping is similar but more focused on passive spying on communication. 

That is why we need email security protocols - they provide protection against such attacks in several ways. For example, protocols like SSL/TLS, SMTPS, and MTA-STS encrypt data during transport, preventing unauthorized access. DKIM adds a digital signature to your email, allowing recipients to check whether the message has been altered during transport. SPF checks if the sender's IP address is on the list of allowed sources for your domain, which helps prevent spammers' unauthorized use of your domain. 

Email security protocols safeguard your data and increase your email deliverability.

How to Improve Email Delivery Through Authentication 

Email authentication is a key component in ensuring your email's successful delivery. You can implement some of the authentication protocols, including SPF, DKIM, DMARC, and BIMI.  Have you ever wondered how each of these protocols works and how you can use them to improve your email delivery? 

SPF (Sender Policy Framework): The SPF protocol helps prevent sender impersonation by checking whether the incoming email comes from a server listed in the domain's SPF records. To implement SPF, you must add an SPF record to your domain's DNS listing all the IP addresses authorized to send email from your domain. 

DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail): The DKIM protocol adds a digital signature to your email, which recipients can use to verify whether the message has been altered during transport. To implement DKIM, you must generate a pair of keys (one private for signing emails, one public for signature verification) and add a DKIM record to your domain's DNS. 

DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance): The DMARC protocol uses information from SPF and DKIM to decide what to do with messages that don't pass these checks. It also provides reports on who is trying to abuse your domain. To implement DMARC, you should add a DMARC record to your domain's DNS listing your policy for handling messages that don't pass SPF or DKIM checks. 

BIMI (Brand Indicators for Message Identification): The BIMI protocol allows you to display your branded logo in your emails, enhancing brand recognition and user trust. To implement BIMI, you need to add a BIMI record to your domain's DNS containing the URL to your logo.

You must implement these protocols to enhance email security and boost your email delivery. When your email successfully goes through these authentication verifications, the odds of it landing directly in the recipient's inbox instead of being relegated to the spam folder increase substantially. These protocols also shield your domain against any abuse, which can harm your reputation and impact email delivery.

Best Practices and Protocols for Email Security

Email security may seem technical, but it is key to protecting your business. It is important to stay updated and implement the latest measures and best practices to mitigate risks. 

Introducing the best practices for email security is not just a recommendation - it's a necessity.

These practices range from simple steps like regularly changing passwords and using two-factor authentication to more complex measures like public key cryptography for encrypting messages. 

The methodology of email encryption heavily relies on public key cryptography, where users exchange keys to decode the message. This is one of the best practices for cloud encryption.

Best practices for login security are designed to protect individuals and organizations. Identity theft scams, for example, use deceptive emails.

How to Use Automated Protocols for Data Protection in Email

Antivirus, anti-malware, and internet security are terms often used interchangeably but have different functions. The best practice is to develop and implement these measures to secure our digital assets.  Every EU member state must adopt a national network and information security strategy, adhering to the best practices guide provided by ENISA.

 

Email security is no longer just a technical issue - it's a key component in protecting the integrity and safety of your business and personal data. To enhance the security of your email, you need to implement some or all of these protocols. That it's the only way to strengthen the defense from digital threats. 

Email security is one of the most important things to consider when it comes to maintaining the integrity of your business. Therefore, invest time and resources to ensure your data protection methods are up to par.

Subscribe to our newsletter
Arrow
Thank you! Your submission has been received!
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.

Video blogs

Why Senders?
10s of millions of emails sent and successfully delivered across thousands of target markets for hundreds of clients.
GET STARTED
Our Clients
From venture-backed startups, SaaS leaders, B2B companies, to B2C brands looking to grow through higher email deliverability and better outreach – we’ve had the pleasure of helping them all.
Erol Toker
CEO,
Truly.co
Testimonial rating
The core of any outbound email motion is the ability to send emails at a high enough volume and actually have those emails delivered to a target’s inbox - that's what Senders does for us.
Ravi Saini
Business Development Manager,
Software Mind
Testimonial rating
We've been working with Senders for about two years so yeah we're happy. You guys have a good set of people in your team and we like this setup around weekly meetings.
Bilal Memon
Founder,
Lovers of Data
Testimonial rating
There's a lot of really really awesome things. I would say the team is just very open for us. Testing things out - different segments, different copy and they turn around time is just very, very quick which I really, really appreciate and that's been consistent since day one.
Testimonial ratingTestimonial - text
Sending a few emails here and there is easy -- sending at a consistently high volume and having them delivered every time is really really hard. Senders handles that for us in spades.
JP Bertram
Vice President of Marketing, ChangeEngine
Sender's Case Studies
SUSO Digital
Industry - Marketing & SEO
Project length - 2 years
Key result - Market growth, funnel saturation
GROWRK
Industry - Information Technology & Services
Project length - ongoing
Key result - New market penetration
Pangea.io
Industry - Fintech
Project length - Ongoing
Key result - Safely scaled email outbound, moved off of Google, improved processes 

Founded by chef David Chang, Momofuku is a renowned culinary brand with a nation-wide presence, including restaurants and an online store with delicious goods. They ran into an issue with their email sending – high bounce rates and blocked sending.

With hundreds of thousands of people on their email lists eager to stay informed, and an impeccable reputation to uphold, Momofuku wanted to nip this problem in the bud quickly.

  • Momofuku reached out to Senders to run a diagnostic test on their sending infrastructure and find the root cause
  • Senders deliverability experts discovered an issue with their DMARC, which was preventing emails from being sent, as their WordPress wasn't aligned with their SPF
  • Senders provided the most effective solution helping Momofuku restore safe sending, and suggested next steps to ensure everything keeps running smoothly on their end
  • The client reported that Senders helped identify the problem and got them back on track 

Up for coffee with a health kick, sans the jitters? Try Everyday Dose – a brand on a mission to provide coffee lovers with a healthy alternative packed with all kinds of goodies. The Founder, Jack Savage, learned through personal experience that we needed an option that doesn’t lead to a slew of possible side-effects. That’s how this mushroom-based blend with nootropics and collagen protein came to be, helping boost focus, energy, and reduce stress in one go.

The Everyday Dose team prides itself on excellent customer support, in addition to their delicious set of products. So when they spotted DNS propagation issues setting up their customer experience platform, they reached out to Senders to find the best way to sort it out.

  • Senders deliverability experts confirmed the problem the team at Everyday Dose initially diagnosed
  • To enable healthy DNS propagation, the Senders team helped clean their DNS registrar of old DNS records that were causing issues with propagation
  • The client reported they were now able to set up their DNS correctly, enabling them to run their platform smoothly

While many follow the latest marketing fads, there are businesses that support their clients with impactful, data-driven strategies for long-haul success. One such business is Influence to Action, creating sales, marketing, and leadership strategies that provide lasting value to growth-centric B2B companies. Both their turnkey and “done with you” services are built to ensure measurable, tangible results, and come with ample flexibility to adapt to the company they’re meant to serve.

Naturally, they wanted to make sure their email sending infrastructure was set up correctly, to protect their reputation and successfully reach their recipients. Our deliverability team worked with the client’s team on:

  • Aligning the client’s three domains with Amazon to make sure they are compatible and optimized in order to integrate with Amazon’s system.
  • Setting up a proper DMARC policy to protect their domains against unauthorized use and phishing scams.
  • Enhancing email deliverability as well as security, so that each email sent from these domains can be properly authenticated and more likely to land in the right inbox.
  • As a result, the client can protect the reputation of their business and domains, while safely sending out their email campaigns.

Sometimes the sheer number of options of any product can be daunting – how on earth do you pick the right one? This is especially true with supplements, as we can find them just about anywhere, but we can rarely understand a third of the ingredients listed. Unlike most, Physician’s Choice provides supplements with pure, potent ingredients that work. No fillers or “proprietary” blends with unidentified ingredients. They do the research, so you don’t have to.

Integrity and transparency are part of their core values, so when their team ran into sending issues, they were referred to Senders.

  • The client’s team spotted issues with DMARC failures in Google Postmaster
  • The Senders deliverability team worked with the client to update the DMARC configuration to enable report collection
  • The client is now able to obtain detailed reports to diagnose the exact causes of the failures and prevent them in the future with proper DMARC setup
All Case Studies