Secure Use of E-Mail - A New Security Awareness Course From Cosaint
The volume of e-mail seems to rise almost inexorably giving rise to more and more concerns about the security of commercial information, the spread of viruses, spam and liability due to harassment. Cosaint's latest web-based training course, "Secure Use of E-Mail", is designed to educate end-users about these issues and provide practical advice on dealing with e-mail in the workplace.
Mount Vernon, WA (PRWEB) September 26, 2003 --Cosaint Inc., a Mount Vernon (WA) based company specializing in online information security education for end-users, today announced a new web-based security awareness course - "Secure Use of E-Mail".
According to Jupiter Communications, an average US internet user received nearly 1800 e-mails in 1999 [Ref 1]. By 2005, this number is expected to have increased to over 5500. And according to a 2002 Gartner Report, 11 billion emails were sent per day worldwide in 2001 with the number expected to rise to more than 36 billion per day by 2005 [Ref 2].
Although not all of this is business e-mail, there are still enough e-mail issues including:
- security of commercial information viruses
- spam and denial of service attacks
- liability due to harassment
to keep HR departments and system administrators awake at night!
Cosaint's latest web-based training course, "Secure Use of E-Mail", is designed to educate end-users about these issues and covers the following topics:
- what should and should not be included in e-mails
- the legal admissability of e-mails
- forwarding e-mails without care
- who is entitled to monitor your e-mail (and who may be)
- the dangers of including sensitive information in unencrypted e-mail
- watching for impersonation, hoaxes and viruses
The material is supported by an (optional) audio track, and interactive exercises for the student. A short mastery test examines the students understanding of the material and, on passing, they can download a certificate to show that theyve finished the course. A simple management interface allows the student's supervisor to monitor progress and to issue gentle reminders should ths prove necessary.
Steve Addison, CEO of Cosaint says:
"E-mail has become so commonplace that we often forget how insecure it is, how it can be abused and how it can easily spread viruses. Our latest course is designed to help organizations educate their end-users about these risks and teach them some basic rules for using e-mail both securely and appropriately."
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References
1. Jupiter Communications quoted on www.bizreport.com
2. Gartner Group quoted on www.econtentmag.com
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