Email phishing continues to be one of the biggest threats to the security for companies worldwide. Phishing activities – ransomware in particular – are among the top threats to both public and private sectors. This is due both to its prevalence and ability to hit hard when successful and means that safeguarding against phishing attacks is now a crucial component when it comes to maintaining a strong security posture.
Impersonation and spoofing are the two main forms of phishing attacks aimed at employees. While the two terms seem interchangeable, they refer to very similar but fundamentally different methods of attack. If it tricks a computer, it’s a spoofing attack. If it tricks a human, it’s an impersonation attack.
To aid in the search for a solution to help tackle this threat we have put together a list of our top picks for an anti-impersonation and spoofing solution. These choices each offer their own distinct features and capabilities and have been examined based on our own technical assessments and customer feedback.
It should be noted that not every vendor on this list offers a single consolidated solution that tackles both issues. More often, vendors will have two separate products that can be deployed together, or some vendors only offer products that target one or the other.
Headquartered in Atlanta, USA, IRONSCALES is the industry’s fastest growing cloud-based email security company. Their AI-driven email security solution, IRONSCALES Email Security Platform, stops particularly advanced threats such as business email compromise (BEC), VIP impersonation, and account takeover (ATO) attempts that slip past existing secure email gateways.
IRONSCALES Email Security Platform
Pricing: IRONSCALES offer companies three tiers of pricing, each with a different range of capabilities that are detailed on their website. There is a Starter™ plan (free version) for up to 500 mailboxes, that includes their full-featured phishing simulation testing functionality and basic email security capabilities; the Email Protect™ plan ($6.00 per mailbox, per month) that adds comprehensive automated email security to what’s included in Starter™; and finally, the Complete Protect™ plan ($8.33 per mailbox, per month), that includes all features of the previous two plans plus Account Takeover protection, Microsoft Teams protection, and unlimited Security Awareness Training. Volume discount pricing is available for Email Protect™ and Complete Protect™ plans. Volume Discount Pricing is available via a quotation request.
Expert Insights Comments: Drawing on the power of artificial intelligence and correlated threat intel from thousands of customer security teams across the globe, IRONSCALES’ emails security solution is overtly robust and effective in preventing a wide range of attacks, including the most sophisticated of attacks, such as anti impersonation and spoofing by removing it from user inboxes before they can interact or respond. It is fast to deploy and configure, with simplified management. Overall, the solution is easy to use for both admins and users alike, with little to no training needed for staff and admins able to navigate through a clean console. We would recommend IRONSCALES for organizations ranging from SMBs to enterprise level.
From San Francisco, USA, comes Abnormal: an advanced specialist in email security founded in just 2018. Inbound Email Protection from Abnormal is a powerful cloud-based email security solution that focuses on preventing inbound and internal threats through an array of tactics, most notably by deploying behavioral AI to tackle these threats.
It’s a comprehensive solution that can securely and effectively block all types of email attacks including malware, ransomware, spoof-based phishing, impersonation attacks, and more. It also has strong filtering for spam and graymail. It’s adept in detecting and quarantining zero-day attacks, as well as ensuring proper email hygiene across the board. It’s an easily deployable solution, with the program up and running in a short span of time.
Abnormal Inbound Email Protection Features
Expert Insights Comments: Abnormal Inbound Email Protection solution is a highly intelligent and adaptive tool that leverages AI to learn how your users interact with other users, both inside the network and out of it. This creates an entirely unique algorithm that can detect when something is amiss or not like usual forms of communication, allowing for instances of business email compromise, account takeover, and impersonation to be blocked. It is also adept in blocking out technical based methods of phishing, such as spoofing. All emails are subject to content analysis, meaning that regular phishing instances and fraudulent emails are also ruled out. It is quick to deploy and has easy integration with Microsoft 365. Abnormal Inbound Email Protection is suitable for most industries, ranging from SMBs to enterprise level.
Avanan, a Check Point company, has established itself as a trusted and capable figure in the email security market since its inception in 2014. Their contribution to this list is the solid and intuitive Avanan Email Security solution which offers powerful protection for user inboxes, warding off standard and advanced threats. Deployment is cloud-based via API, making it straightforward, fast, and intuitive to complete, as well as capable of being up and running in a matter of minutes. This solution integrates well with cloud-based email servers and does not impact MX records.
Avanan Email Security Features
Pricing: For companies with under 500 employees, pricing plans begin at $3.60 per user per month, and up to $6.00 per user per month for a more expansive plan. For companies exceeding 500, pricing is supplied upon request.
Expert Insights’ Comments: Organizations looking for a smart and adaptive email security solution with additional helpful features can stand to benefit from deploying Avanan Email Security. It offers fast-actioned and robust security at the email gateway and to other communication channels like Slack. It wards inboxes from spoofing, impersonation, malicious attachments, phishing, malware, and more. It is an easy to deploy solution, though with a slight learning curve for configurations. We would recommend Avanan to any organization using a cloud-hosted email server, such as Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace.
Barracuda is a highly respected vendor with powerful solutions in the email security space. Their Barracuda Email Protection product is a comprehensive email gateway solution that has spoofing and impersonation targeting capabilities. It combines an email getaway with direct API integration that is easy to integrate with Office 365. It uses AI-based threat detection, allowing for the detection and response to potential impersonation and spoofing based threats in real-time.
Barracuda Email Protection Features
Pricing: Barracuda provides a questionnaire on their site to estimate the cost of implementing Barracuda Email Protection, based on the organization’s requirements and size.
Expert Insights’ Comments: Barracuda Email Protection is an artificial intelligence-powered tool that offers full protection for your email communications, both inbound, outbound, and internal. It is feature rich, with additional add-ons to offer a full email security stack that prevents users from accessing anything malicious directly. It leverages AI that learns how your organization operates and communicates. From there, it is able to identify unusual behavior in email communications and can block and quarantine accordingly, preventing risks such as spear-phishing attacks. Alongside social engineering threats, Barracuda’s Email Protection’s email gateway constantly scans and blocks for any spoofing-based threats. It also offers training solutions to teach users about potential risks and send simulations to test their knowledge. We would recommend this solution to organizations of all sizes who use Office 365 software.
Headquartered in San Jose, California, Cisco, is an American multinational digital communications technology conglomerate corporation. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense is a comprehensive email security solution designed to safeguard inboxes and organizations from a variety of threats, including phishing, business email compromise, malware, and ransomware. The solution utilizes advanced threat analysis to detect malicious techniques used in attacks and categorizes threats to provide insights into vulnerable areas within an organization.
Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense Features
Pricing
Pricing for Secure Email Threat Defense is on a per-user basis, meaning it applies to a single-knowledge worker. Sign up for a 30-day free trial on the Cisco website.
Expert Insights’ Comments
Cisco is a trusted provider of advanced email protection for businesses globally. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense streamlines the process of threat remediation by delivering robust, actionable threat data and powerful search capabilities. This enables quick access to message details, facilitating more informed and expedited responses to potential threats. Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense also integrates with Cisco Extended Detection and Response (XDR) for rapid message remediation, allowing teams to act quickly and efficiently for maximum threat protection. We would recommend Cisco Secure Email Threat Defense to organizations looking to expand the scope of their defenses, identify specific business risks, and effectively remediate threats.
Headquartered in Boston, USA, Mimecast is a global email security, email archiving, and continuity vendor. Mimecast Email Security is a consolidation of several cloud-based email security solutions, including email security, security awareness training, cloud archive, DMARC analysis, and web security. Mimecast’s DMARC analyzer protects your organization from spoofing-based attacks. It combines DMARC, SPF, and DKIM protocols to report to admins when the company domain is being used without authorization and can block all unauthenticated mail. The DMARC analyzer detects when IP packets – the bit that displays an email header, including sender ID and location – have been spoofed, and will block and quarantine this content until it has been checked by administrators before acting.
Mimecast Email Security Features
Pricing: Mimecast’s Email Security product comes in a range of plans, not all offering both solutions covered in this listing. Pricing is supplied via a quotation request.
Expert Insights’ Comments: Organizations looking for an overly powerful solution with a full stack of strong and intelligent features can gain from deploying Mimecast Email Security. Adaptive, powerful, and feature rich, it is highly adept in detecting and filtering out instances of spoofing and impersonation through DMARC, SPF, and DKIM protocols. It has a high level of customer satisfaction, and is generally easy to use, manage, and deploy. End users have a certain level of agency with a self-service tool that grants them limited control such as the ability to block senders. While Mimecast is more suited to enterprises, more affordable, tailored plans are available for small businesses.
Headquartered in Sunnyvale, CA, USA is Proofpoint, a market leader in email security. Their solution, Proofpoint Email Protection, is a fully featured and integrated email security solution that offers protection from impersonation and spoofing attacks. It is a consolidation of secure email gateway, encryption, management, URL, and attachment defense features, and more. This solution is easily deployable on Microsoft 365, G-Suite, and Exchange mail providers. Admins receive strong granular access policies, flexible yet powerful policy and filter capabilities, and a comprehensive and intuitive interface.
Proofpoint Email Protection Features
Pricing: Pricing is supplied via a quotation request.
Expert Insights’ Comments: Proofpoint Email Protection is adept at safeguarding your business against both spoofing and impersonation-based email threats. The product includes advanced BEC defense which prevents a number of email fraud tactics. This detection engine is AI and machine learning-driven and can analyze header data and subsequent IP packets, sender’s IP address, and the actual content of the email itself for any particularly suspicious words and phrases, or urgent and demanding language. It can also scan for reply-to pivots, malicious IPs, and use of impersonated supplier domains. It is a powerful yet easily and highly scalable solution, making it a strong choice for large enterprises.
Titan HQ Phishing Protection is a cutting-edge solution for phishing protection and remediation, which integrates seamlessly with Microsoft 365. Its primary focus is on catching and resolving advanced, zero-day phishing attacks that may otherwise be missed, mitigating potential risk. Titan HQ Phishing Protection uses a proprietary machine-learning algorithm, resulting in detailed and accurate phishing threat detection and post-delivery remediation.
Titan HQ Phishing Protection Features:
Expert Insights’ Comments:
This solution performs a multi-layered analysis including textual analysis, link analysis, and attachment scanning, utilizing machine learning models to detect phishing threats in emails. Titan HQ Phishing Protection also performs URL analysis, identifying any links that redirect to malicious websites. The solution is a robust and efficient tool for phishing detection and remediation with distinctive features such as Post Delivery Remediation and native M365 integration. It is an excellent choice for organizations looking for extensive and effortless phishing protection in their Microsoft 365 environment.
Trend Micro, a Japanese cyber security software company, are a global cybersecurity leader who offer a platform designed to protect organizations and individuals across networks, clouds, devices, and endpoints. Trend Micro Email Security is a comprehensive solution that defends against phishing, ransomware, and business email compromise (BEC) attacks. Compatible with Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft 365, Gmail, and other hosted or on-premises email solutions, it integrates with Trend Micro’s security layers to grant central visibility of threats and share threat intelligence across an organization.
Trend Micro Email Security Features
Pricing
Contact Trend Micro directly for pricing information or try the service free for 30 days.
Expert Insights’ Comments
Trend Micro Email security employs cross-generational threat techniques, such as machine learning, sandbox analysis, data loss prevention (DLP), and others, for enhanced protection against advanced threats. In addition to its robust threat defense, Trend Micro Email Security focuses on safeguarding against business email compromise attacks. It does so by analyzing email behavior, intention, and authorship, and can be enhanced by integrating Trend Micro Writing Style DNA for authorship analysis (with Trend Micro Cloud App Security). We would recommend Trend Micro Email security to organizations looking for robust threat defense against impersonation and spoofing attacks, done via behavior analysis and detection.
Email phishing attacks are getting more sophisticated by the day. Despite best efforts, phishing continues to be the number one cause for the majority of successful breaches and attacks. These attacks are also getting increasingly costly, with the average cost of a data breach being 4.35 million dollars according to IBM.
Spoofing and impersonation attacks fall under the wide and insidious umbrella of phishing. Both involve sending out fraudulent emails with the intent of duping users into clicking on malicious files and attachments, clicking bogus links, or responding with highly sensitive information. The outcome is the same, but the methods are different. While security awareness training can be a huge help in preventing your users from falling victim, it’s not a cure all, so safeguarding at every level is a must to protect you and your brand from phishing–in all its forms.
Domain spoofing is a popular phishing method in which a threat attacker will “spoof” a domain with the intention of impersonating a trusted figure, organization, or site. Spoofing is a technical process, which involves modifying the header of an email to give a different sender ID and address than the actual one. The benefit of a technical-based attack is, if protocols are configured correctly and proper preventative measures are in place, email security solutions that have Secure Email Gateways built in can detect these spoofed emails and block and quarantine them, averting disaster.
Domain impersonation is a bit different. Rather than relying on tech, the success of domain impersonation attacks usually comes down to human error. Typically, this involves an individual having a lapse in judgment and clicking on a malicious link or file.
Attackers go to great lengths to impersonate trusted senders, making them look legitimate – though there are often giveaways. In the past, having staff trained against the dangers of impersonation and other cyberattacks was the only preventative tactic, but more and more companies are developing AI-based and communication-based strategies that can pick up on the signs a sender and their email is being impersonated – and alert the end-user and admins. Solutions that tackle these issues are AI and machine learning technology, DMARC, SPF, and DKIM configurations, language, and sender analysis, SEGs, and more.
Since solutions designed to tackle the issues of impersonation and spoofing can vary so widely in their scope and capabilities, there is no one set of features to expect. However, some useful capabilities to look for include the following:
Mirren McDade is a senior writer and journalist at Expert Insights, spending each day researching, writing, editing and publishing content, covering a variety of topics and solutions, and interviewing industry experts. She is an experienced copywriter with a background in a range of industries, including cloud business technologies, cloud security, information security and cyber security, and has conducted interviews with several industry experts. Mirren holds a First Class Honors degree in English from Edinburgh Napier University.
Craig MacAlpine is CEO and founder of Expert Insights. Before founding Expert Insights in August 2018, Craig spent 10 years as CEO of EPA cloud, an email security provider acquired by Ziff Davies, formerly J2Global (NASQAQ: ZD) in 2013, which has now been rebranded as VIPRE Email Security. Craig has extensive experience in the email security industry, with 20+ years of experience helping organizations to stay secure with innovative information security and cyber security solutions.