New Security Services Put E-Mail Content Under Microscope

Web security company MessageLabs announced March 9 the launch of new versions of managed e-mail services that allow enterprises to control content sent to or from employees and detect images deemed inappropriate.

The company has released version 3.0 of its Email Content Control and version 2.0 of its Email Image Control services. The offerings will help businesses enforce use policies for e-mail and meet regulatory and legislative compliance requirements by monitoring and controlling image and text-based e-mail content into and out of organizations, said Brian Czarny, vice president of product management with MessageLabs.

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"Content Control enables organizations to address the issue of confidential, malicious or inappropriate e-mail content sent or received by the organization," Czarny said in an interview with eWEEK. "Easy to set up and maintain, it proactively identifies and controls e-mail content, thus protecting an organization from risk."

The services are customizable and allow customers to set up various sensitivity settings and routing options, company officials said.

The offerings come as increased attention is being paid to so-called insider threats and corporate security policies for the sake of meeting regulatory and industry compliance standards.

Both services can help protect businesses from damage to their brand, harassment in the form of offensive e-mail messages and content and reduce legal liability, Czarny said.

"Every organization has vast amounts of valuable, and often confidential, information moving across their e-mail systems each day," said Jos White, president of MessageLabs, in a statement.

"Taking a proactive, technology based approach to email policy enforcement and security removes the risk of a violation either through human error or misconduct."

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