How to Secure Email For Exchanging Confidential Documents

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Email is used by billions of individuals around the world to communicate. It’s not always the best option when it comes to send sensitive documents. Data breaches and cyber-threats are increasing. It is essential to know how to send sensitive data safely via email.

In most instances it’s not a wise idea to share confidential information in an unencrypted email message or as an attachment. This includes personal information like social security numbers, passport information and bank account details and even business confidential documents. If you have to send confidential information in an email, there are a few things you can do to protect yourself and your recipients.

Adding a disclaimer is one way to warn recipients of the risk that could be that could be involved. These disclaimers aren’t legally binding, and serve only to make clear the fact that the email is private.

You can also opt for an email encryption service. This is more efficient and requires both you and your recipient to use systems that can support this (e.g. S/MIME or the PGP protocol are two options. There are also programs to compress files prior transferring them by email, which will help reduce the size of the document and make it more difficult for hackers to steal your communications. Alternatively, you can password protect the document and make it impossible to open without the password.

By limiting the time for the password will ensure that the user can only access the document within a specific time. For emails for business, enabling two factor authentication in your email system will improve security.