Top Five ways to protect emails in the event of a hacking attack

The Sony hack, the latest in a wave of company security breaches,
exposed months of employee emails. Other hacks have given attackers
access to sensitive information about a company and its customers, such
as credit-card numbers and email addresses. One way hackers can sneak
into a company is by sending fake emails with malicious links to
employee inboxes. Here are five simple steps to make your email more
secure and limit the harm a hacker can have:


Archive Early and Often Most corporate email systems allow people to
set up regularly scheduled archiving so that emails are moved off of
the server after a certain number of days. You can still check archived
emails on your work computer, but they are no longer easily accessible
on websites outside the office or on your phone. That limits hackers'
ability to access those emails too. You can make exceptions for emails
that you want to keep in your active inbox, and they won't be archived.

Get Organised As emails come into your inbox, deal with them. Sort them
into folders. This segments your data, requiring an attacker to know
which folder to go to, or to take multiple steps to search for wanted
information.
Paired with archiving, it also ensures that what the hacker does
compromise is limited and known for any future damage assessment.
Sensitive information can also be removed from your inbox. For example,
delete an email and save what you need to your hard drive or an
external drive.


Keep Work and Personal Emails Separate Don't use your work email for
personal email or activities online. That limits details a hacker can
glean about you to conduct more sophisticated attacks targeting you as
the entryway into your company's system. For example, hackers can learn
about your shopping habits or personal hobbies and use those to send a
phishing email that appears to come from websites you bought goods from
or read frequently. Phishing messages route you to a fake address and
allow hackers to gain access to your system. Don't Click on Unexpected
Links And Attachments If you receive an email with a link or attachment
you weren't expecting, send the person a separate email asking whether
the first email was legitimate. For links from companies such as
banking institutions, hover your cursor over the hyperlink or
right-click to show the link's final destination. Before you click,
make sure the address that pops up when you hover over the link matches
where the hyperlink says you'll be sent. If unsure, use a new window
and physically type in the website's address to conduct your business.
If You See Something, Say Something If your email is acting up or a
link or attachment strikes you as strange, forward it to your IT
department as quickly as possible. Your attention and fast response may
prevent someone else at your company from making a mistake.