Get More Email Opens By Securing Your Brand

Email is an old technology. Spoofing, or faking who an email is from, is as easy as writing a few lines of code.

Think of email just like your mailbox outside your home. Anyone can drive by and drop a letter into it. Write in the top left hand corner “From: Dear Old Granny” and voila.. the wolf is inside in your home.

Email really isn’t any different… except that with newer security checks like SPF, DKIM & now DMARC it’s a lot easier to verify grandma’s letter is not actually from the Big Bad Wolf.

It’s likely bad actors are dropping hundreds of letters into mail systems “from you” today. If you aren’t 100% secured and marking those as rejected, they are ruining your good name and reputation.

Check your domain here: Domain Check

Our tools give us a pretty good idea of who is utilizing your email domain for nefarious purposes. The extent and volume of the problem is what to worry about more.

The more spammy/hacker emails sent “by you” to inboxes the worse your email domains reputation will get. Some clients of ours that we have fixed were so bad in the beginning that even the CEO couldn’t send 1-to-1 emails to key contacts.

At the end of our process it won’t matter who was attacking you, since all unauthenticated sources of email will be outright rejected.

This clears your good name.

Shadow IT is when different individuals or departments set up systems without the IT team. It is VERY COMMON with email systems. 

Quickly setting your DMARC record to reject is easy. We find more often than not though that this practice instantly starts blocking legitimate email for the organization (typically email marketing and automation systems) which impacts revenue right away.

Our process typically runs about 22 days as we use the flow of XML data returned by ESPs to slowly map out and verify all email systems using records for SPF, DKIM and/or DMARC where needed. When those systems are all authenticated only then can you confidently tell ESPs to reject all other messages.

Check your DMARC record now: DMARC Inspection Tool

SPF (Sender Policy Framework) can be pretty simple if your email infrastructure is simple.

Companies start to run into problems when they need to verify multiple email systems and they try to do it all on their main domain (don’t do it – subdomains are your friend).

Once you go over 10 lookups you are bound to start having issues. Also, if you allow too many IP addresses.. particularly with IP flattening you are opening up your systems to increased exploitation as well.

Using email expertise to limit bloat and complication in your SPF record will improve deliverability and limit your exposure risk.

Check your SPF record now: SPF Survey Tool

Google and Yahoo partnered together to set stricter standards on email senders. Those standards went into place in Feb 2024.

If your email marketing has suffered recently then this is likely once source of the problem.

Google Email Sender Guidelines

Yahoo Sender Requirements

May 2024 – FBI, NSA, US Dept of Defense

All 3 agencies released this Joint CyberSecurity Advisory following email attacks using weak DMARC by North Korean Actors.

Essentially attackers were exploiting domains with weak DMARC policies to conduct spearphishing campaigns. If you have no DMARC or a weak DMARC you are likely at risk.

CSA – media.defense.gov (PDF)

March 2025 – PCI DSS v4.0 Compliance

If you process credit card information you are likely familiar with the mandatory regulations of PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards). PCI DSS v4.0 has notable focus on email authentication.

Here is one snippet:

• Anti-Phishing Protection: Companies must find automated processes such as email authentication protocols (SPF, DKIM, and DMARC) to safeguard themselves.

You can read more in greater detail here: securityboulevard.com/2023/07/dmarc-is-becoming-mandatory-for-pci-dss-compliance/