We have been asked a number of times recently about how to ensure secure transfer of data by email. This is a complicated question and the options available will depend on your organisation's tech set up and the data you need to send.
The following email encryption options may be useful for your small charity or community group.
Encyption for Office 365 Users
Email encryption is available in Office 365 as part of Azure Information Protection. This is available either as part of an Enterprise plan (E3 or above), or through a purchased add-on, such as "Enterprise Mobility + Security E3 for Non-Profits" at £1.24 per user per month (or for non-eligible users as "Azure Information Protection Plan 1" at £1.50 per user per month).
This gives more than just Email encryption, as allows documents to be classified on a sensitivity scale, which follows the document and determines who can do what with it. The "Enterprise Mobility + Security E3 for Non-Profits" also includes some other security related functionality over and above the standard "Azure Information Protection Plan 1".
See here for a comparison between the different Office 365 encryption options.
Encryption for Google Non-Profit Users
In addition to the standard encryption available to Gmail users and the red lock icon alerting you to recipients who may not be using encrypted email - Google offer the additional GAME (G Suite Message Encryption) service.
This is a service developed by ZixCorp and integrated within Gmail. When the recipient receives the email, they would either need to log into the Secure message portal to read and reply to the email or if they are a GAME (or ZixCorp) subscriber, the email will come directly into their inbox.
The encryption of outgoing email can be done automatically (based on rules set in place, that identify details in the body of the email which need to be encrypted, e.g. credit card numbers) or by including a pre-defined keyword.
The latest charge we can find on this was from 2014 and it was $35 per user per year.
More information can be found on the Zixcorp website.
Encryption for all other users
For other users there are a number of Email encryption products available. One example is Egress Switch Secure Email. The cost of this is £80 per user per year (plus VAT) for 1-4 users, or £60 per user per year for 5-9 users. They offer charity pricing but only when you have above 10 users, the cost is £650 per year.
Please get in touch if you'd like some support to find the best solution for your particular case.
