Messaging News - June 2008 - (Page 17)

out that servers are only upgradeable to a point before its necessary to buy entirely new systems. “Organizations are only willing to spend so much to horizontally scale out their mail systems to stop traffic that will never end up in their user’s inboxes. A primary question for service providers and organizations alike is, ‘how will you identify malicious traffic faster, and drop the connection so that a minimum amount of systems resources on their servers are utilized?’” “Once Burned” Need Not Apply User education remains at the top of the list for business best practices. Why, then after endless cover- it, effective social engineering is the single most important factor to any cyber crime campaign. “If the tactic used doesn’t grab someone’s attention and make them want to click the link or open the attachment in the email, then the ROI to the spammer will be significantly reduced.” Kirsch adds that user education only goes so far, “Phishing attacks are cleverly designed to elicit a response. Clearly, we need both better techniques to detect them Expert Recommendations and Advice Organizations need to be protected believes Sam Masiello, director of Threat Management for MX Logic. He suggests the following steps: • Invest in a top-notch email and virus filtering solution. Consider a managed service with the benefit that it does not need to be installed, monitored or upgraded by the company. It’s all done automatically. • Educate employees. Do not limit training to email security. Threats can be accessed and delivered via the Web, IM, and even cell phones. • Establish clear guidelines. The majority of security breaches and data loss incidents are the result of human error. Steve Kirsch, founder and chairman of the board for Abaca Technology recommends organizations: • Select a spam filter that does not rely on content filtering or heuristics, both of which are easily defeated by spammers. • Reduce the volume of spam that consumes the company network. Choose a solution that does not rely on content to rate the message. • Increase overall security. Make sure to have some sort of phishing protection in the browser selected. MB/TMP “The more spam pollution on the Internet highway, the less reliable and efficient email becomes for us all.”—Sam Masiello, MX Logic age of terrible email viruses, would seemingly intelligent individuals open the “Hi, it’s me!” attachment? “While it may seem difficult to imagine anyone falling for [phishing attacks], keep in mind that these messages are sent to tens or even hundreds of millions of people. Even if .0001 percent out of 100 million people opens the email, that’s 100 people. It generally doesn’t cost the spammer any more to send one message versus one billion messages. It’s simply a numbers game. In the end, deliverability equals profitability for the spammer,” said Masiello. Many of today’s spam or phishing attacks are designed around social engineering. Meant to pique the recipients’ interest, spammers choose topics they believe will catch people’s attention. As Kirsch explains and also better user education.” Eradicating spam may not be possible in our lifetime. As long as there is human curiosity, opened attachments will open doors in the enterprise network. MB/TMP FOR YOUR REFERENCE Abaca Technology Corporation www.abaca.com Ferris Research www.ferris.com MessageGate, Inc. www.messagegate.com MX Logic, Inc. www.mxlogic.com messagingnews.com 17 http://www.abaca.com http://www.ferris.com http://www.messagegate.com http://www.mxlogic.com http://www.messagingnews.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Messaging News - June 2008

Messaging News - June 2008 Editor’s Note Short Takes Classification & Retention Spam: Bigger, Faster, and More Dangerous Bad Behavior and Today’s Reputation Analysis The Changing Locus of Collaboration Serving Up Managed and Hosted Messaging Solutions “On Message” with Ben Gross SCAP Standard Benefits Both Government and Commercial Space Making the Case Learn More

Messaging News - June 2008

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