When you are start a business it is important to establish a policy on when you need to encrypt mail that is sent over the Internet. The best policy would be to implement an encryption program right from the start, alleviating any risk of loosing valuable information.

Data mining is one of the largest criminal activities on the Internet. Hackers intercept transmissions being sent through email, scan the data for later review, and let the email proceed to its destination. Emails that are not encrypted are sought out first, they are easy prey. However, when you encrypt mail, the data miners often move on, looking for an easier target.

How do they benefit from such activity? There are many ways. First and foremost is the personal data they collect that can be used to establish new identities. Names, addresses, Social Security numbers and more are often transmitted in emails or their attachments. Financial data can be found in this manner also. Account numbers, balances and even investment data is worth a lot in the data mining industry. Corporations are also very susceptible to data mining as criminals search for product information or development ideas. In a highly competitive market, loss of this information could destroy an entire company.

Email encryption will change the email to a coded message before it enters the Internet. The only person that will be able to decode the message is the intended recipient. This protects all parties involved.

ZixMail is the largest provider of email encryption services in the U.S. With a directory of over 1 million email addresses on file, emails flow through the sytem without criminal interception.

ZixMail also understands that not everyone is subscribed to their service. This is not a problem. When you send an encrypted email to a non-subscriber they will still have access to the email, and it will still be protected. When an email is sent to a non-subscriber, ZixMail will notify them that an encrypted message awaits them and provides them an access key to retrieve the mail from the system. There is no additional charge for this service to either party, and the code is erased once the email has been retrieved so that system integrity remains intact.