SpamTitan to Benefit from Webroot Email Security Market Exit

Following the news that Boulder-based Internet security company, Webroot, is set to leave the email security market, many IT security professionals have started looking for an alternative solution to deal with their organizations’ spam problems. A great many IT security professionals will be sorry to lose Webroot email security products, having relied on their protection for a number of years. Webroot email security solutions were popular and effective.

Two months previously, Webroot was reported to be looking to leave the email security market, and is to retire support for its products as 2013 comes to a close. A lack of support means a change will be necessary for any company currently running Webroot email security solutions if they are to keep their email systems protected. Fortunately, SpamTitan is well positioned to take up the reins.

The company offers industry leading cloud-based anti-spam service tailored to the needs of individual businesses. Not only do the company’s products boast a high success rate – blocking over 99% of spam emails – they also have a very low false positive rate.

SpamTitan also boasts one of the most competitive pricing models of any anti-email spam service. With IT security budgets stretched to breaking point already, this will come as very welcome news to CIOs, CISOs and IT security professionals.

SpamTitan Enterprise Anti-Spam Solutions

To date, SpamTitan has been deployed in over 100 different countries around the world, with IT security professionals choosing the company’s products for their exceptionally high spam catch rates. The products have consistently scored highly in independent anti-spam tests, and boast a catch rate in excess of 99.97%. The high catch rate is achieved, in part, by using dual AV engines. This ensures that if one engine fails to catch a spam message or phishing email, there is an excellent chance that the second engine will. The two industry-leading AV engines used by SpamTitan are those developed by Bitdefender and Clam Anti-Virus.

Additionally, the products have a false positive rate of virtually 0%, with next to no genuine emails mistakenly caught up in the spam filters. Businesses can therefore use the products with confidence, knowing that important, genuine emails will be delivered to the correct recipients. As a result, IT professionals will not be bombarded with requests by employees to look for expected emails that have not been received.

SpamTitan is much loved by users because of the ease at which the company’s solution can be implemented. System administrators love the products for the easy-to-use interface and level of customization possible. This allows tweaks to be made to suit each organization’s needs and requirements. Multiple deployment options are also offered, such as ISO, Vmware, in addition to the ever popular SpamTitan On Demand.

The products also boast excellent protection from phishing emails thanks to a powerful and robust anti-phishing email module. Phishing emails are a growing threat to network security, and with higher volumes of malicious emails now being sent, this is a very important feature to help ensure network security.

Need to Switch from Webroot to Another Anti-Spam Service Provider?

Any organization looking to make the switch from the soon-to-be unsupported Webroot to a new anti-spam solution provider should contact SpamTitan to discuss the options available. Advice can be offered on migration from Webroot and other anti-spam providers to ensure a seamless transition.

New SpamTitan customers also benefit from a totally free 30-day trial period, with prices starting from as little as $395 per month.

Further information on anti-spam, anti-phishing, and web-filtering solutions can be obtained by emailing the Customer Service team on info@spamtitan.com

Email Scammers are in Love with St. Valentine’s Day

There are only two days to go before the red roses arrive, you get a box of chocolates, are taken out for a meal and treated to a night of passion (well, we hope so!). You may therefore want to start preparing. Maybe get a nice dress or a swanky new suit so you can look at your best.

You should also prepare for the onslaught of spam and phishing emails that are likely to be heading your way. Cyber criminals, spammers and scammers have fallen in love with St. Valentine’s Day. They take advantage of the human need to be loved and send out just the type of email people are hoping to receive.

Unfortunately, if you respond, you will not be treated to a night of passion and you will not discover a new secret admirer. You are likely to have malware installed or your bank account emptied.

Beware of scam emails and St. Valentine’s social media scams

In years gone by, scammers primarily used email or the telephone to fraudulently obtain money from the unwary or gullible. The meteoric rise in popularity of social media networks has given criminals a much easier opportunity to make money. There are phishing scams aplenty on social media networks.

However, email continues to work well for the scammers. Many people look for ways to save money on St. Valentine’s Day, and respond to emails offering discounts on flowers, chocolates, gifts, and holidays.

Spam emails typically sent by criminals tend to have subject lines such as “Will you be my Valentine?”, “Valentine’s Day Jewelry”, and “Cheap Flowers for Valentine’s Day”. The same subject lines that could possibly be sent by legitimate retailers or potential lovers. This is why the emails are opened by so many people.

In March, 2010, the results of a new study were published by the Messaging Anti-Abuse Working Group. The study looked at why people fall for email scams. The study was conducted on 3,716 individuals and they were asked questions about their response to spam email.

In some cases, it was not a failure to identify an email as spam that resulted in the email being opened, but because the recipient was genuinely interested in the products or services being offered. 11% of respondents opened the messages, knowing that the email was spam and 15% of those individuals did so because they liked the sound of the offer or product.

Scammers are aware that a percentage of their emails will be opened, and also that many people will respond and disclose information. The more emails that can be sent, the bigger the response will be and the more money will be made. The volume of spam emails being sent is therefore unlikely to decrease. The only thing that will stop the emails is when it is no longer profitable to send them.

How to avoid becoming a victim of a scam or phishing campaign this Valentine’s Day

Businesses need to be particularly wary this Valentine’s Day. If these malicious emails are delivered to employees’ inboxes, a percentage (11% according to the study) of those employees will open them. Many may visit malicious websites as a result – a link to a malicious website offering cut price jewelry with free next day delivery. They may even open malware-infected attachments – a JPEG picture of an admirer for example that is really a cunningly masked executable file.

By installing a spam filter with an anti-phishing component, the vast majority of these emails will be caught and quarantined and, if one does get through, the user will be prevented from visiting a malicious website. In the case of SpamTitan, 99.97% of those emails can be blocked. This is one of the best steps that can be taken to protect networks from malware delivered via email.

Additional protections include:

  • Instructing employees how to identify a phishing attack, and teaching best practices to follow to avoid compromising a network or becoming a victim of a scam.
  • Develop a culture of security awareness. Get employees to stop and think before taking an action and always to suspect that an email may be a phishing attack
  • Never to unsubscribe from an email mailing list they haven’t joined. The email can be marked as junk and all future emails will be delivered to the spam folder, or caught in an Anti-Spam filter if one has been installed
  • If an offer is interesting enough to warrant a response, contact the company via its official website or use the telephone. The contact details can be found in the phone book or through the search engines. Do not contact the company using the details supplied in the email
  • Keep all Anti-Virus, Anti-Malware, and Anti-Spam definitions up to date
  • Tell staff not to trust any unsolicited email they receive