Email security solutions for MSPs protect businesses against email threats such as phishing, ransomware and account compromise by identifying malicious email content, and preventing it from reaching user inboxes.
As email risks continue to rise, many Managed Service Providers (MSPs) are finding themselves looking for a strong email security solution to protect their clients.
This is no easy task; there are a range of email security solutions in a crowded market. Each solution comes with its own unique features, benefits, pricing models, and a whole range of other factors to consider, like cloud-based deployments, email clients and support.
Email remains the top vector for cybersecurity threats, and ensuring a secure inbox is vital to protecting your client’s business networks. MSPs will want to work with a market leader in the email security market, with a strong, innovative security technology, a good partner portal and a partner program that provides the support you need. Pricing and pricing models are also important, so that partners can maximize revenue and generate sustainable recurring revenue streams to grow their business.
With these considerations in mind, here’s our list of the top email security solutions for Managed Service Providers. In this article we’ll give a brief overview of each solution, a breakdown of the key features, a cost analysis, some partner benefits, and our overall thoughts about who each product is best for.
SpamTitan Cloud is a cloud-based secure email gateway service that protects organizations against inbound email threats such as spam, malicious links and attachments and phishing attacks. SpamTitan offer a range of threat protection features for email, including anti-virus and malware protection, whitelisting, blacklisting and greylisting, email content filtering and protection from zero-day attacks. SpamTitan Cloud is popular with MSPs for its ease of management, threat protection features, and affordable monthly billing. SpamTitan is also highly scalable, able to be deployed across any number of users, supporting multiple domains, and offering multi-level administration.
SpamTitan provides effective anti-spam and malware blocking, utilizing multiple layers of spam detection at the email gateway. SpamTitan Cloud is powered via Multiple anti-virus engines power malicious URL and attachment protection by scanning for threats in real-time. SpamTitan also offer content control via email, allowing IT teams to whitelist, blacklist and grey-list email content to ensure employee security and maintain professional compliance. SpamTitan offers customizable email policies, allowing each user, domain and domain group to manage their own blacklists.
SpamTitan Cloud is easy to manage and deploy – important features for MSP customers. The platform has a low maintained overhead, automating updates and fully managed through a web-based management console. SpamTitan also offer an extensive set of APIs to allow MSPs to integrate SpamTitan into their third-party management products and API infrastructure. SpamTitan can be fully white-labelled and has a flexible pricing model. In addition, SpamTitan offer a full suite of reports for each domain, allowing service providers to demonstrate the effectiveness of the spam-filtering service.
Trustifi provides enhanced protection for email communications, with secure end-to-end email encryption for all email platforms. Trustifi is extremely easy to use; senders are able to encrypt emails in just one click, and recipients are able to access encrypted emails seamlessly in their email inbox, without needing to create an account or use a web portal. Trustifi is fully cloud-based and a strong solution for MSPs supporting clients on Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace.
Trustifi provides three key email security features: secure end-to-end encryption, compliant data loss protection and protection against malware and phishing, with whitelisting and blacklisting options. Encrypted emails are delivered instantly, with comprehensive protection for inbound and outbound and protection. Encrypted emails are sent with two-factor authentication, requiring the recipient to verify their identity, but avoiding the need for them to create an account, or use a web-based email portal. There are a range of policies available for admins to prevent data-loss and Trustifi is fully compliant with HIPAA/HITECH, GDPR, CCPA, FSA and more.
Trustifi is a strong solution for MSPs. The service is deployed to cloud-based email services such as Outlook and Gmail via API integration; meaning it’s quick and straightforward to deploy. Trustifi supports multi-tenant based deployment, making it even easier to configure rules across your client-base efficiently. Trustifi can also be fully rebranded and white-labelled to reflect your brand and provides one-one-training and support for MSP clients. We’d recommend Trustifi for MSPs and resellers looking for powerful, cloud-based email security.
Proofpoint is the world’s largest email security vendor, with annual revenues of over $1bn. Proofpoint collect and analyze more than 100 billion data points a day from more than 100 million email boxes. Proofpoint Essentials is a market-leading email security solution aimed at small to mid-sized organizations. Essentials is a strong solution for spam-filtering, malware protection, encryption, archiving and continuity, delivered in a single platform.
Proofpoint Essentials provides strong email protection by combining powerful anti-virus, URL scanning and attachment sandboxing. It’s easy to manage, giving each end-user access to their own email quarantine and email archive. It’s also simple to deploy, working well in cloud-based email environments. Proofpoint Essentials offers advanced protection from phishing attacks and insider threats and offers a range of granular admin policies.
Proofpoint offer flexible pricing modules, with competitive margins for MSPs. MSPs also benefit from an easy-to-use multi-tenant dashboard, which makes managing the service and creating automated reports very straight forward. Proofpoint partners also benefit from a free, 50-user NFR license. Proofpoint provide strong support for partners, offering a range of marketing materials and regular webinars. With flexible pricing modules and a suite of security options that include Encryption, Archiving and Continuity, Proofpoint Essentials is a popular choice for MSPs.
AppRiver offer a range of email security and threat protection services to protect organizations. Their cloud based secure email gateway provides multi-layered protection of email threats across the organization. In December 2021, AppRiver was acquired by OpenText, aligning the service with their Webroot and Carbonite security solutions. AppRiver provides real-time threat protection against advanced email threats, including business email compromise, phishing attacks, and other forms of social engineering attacks. AppRiver’s advanced email security service blocks 99% of un-wanted email and malware threats.
AppRiver offer a range of threat protection features. This includes protection against spam and malware, with dedicated Impersonation Protection to defend users against targeted email attacks like business email compromise. This works by detecting deceptive email addresses and comparing them to display names – allowing AppRiver to automatically quarantine malicious messages, or flag suspicious emails with a customizable indicator in the email subject line. AppRiver deploys easily into the email environment and is managed via a modern email dashboard.
AppRiver offers five tiers of partner benefits, which include marketing assistance, performance incentives, thought leadership, discounts and training. AppRiver’s cloud-based email security solutions are quick and straightforward to deploy and manage, and scalable to organization of all sizes. AppRiver partners also benefit from comprehensive migration and technical support. AppRiver’s solutions work well with Office 365, making it a good option for MSPs looking for a range of email and endpoint protections designed for this environment.
Avanan are a cloud email security gateway provider that offer a full threat protection suite for Office 365 and G Suite. Avanan protect organizations from advanced and targeted email threats, including spear-phishing and account compromise. Unlike traditional email gateways, Avanan’s solution sits inside the email environment to protect against internal email threats and prevents threats from reaching the inbox. Avanan is deployed via API-based integration in just a few minutes, without requiring any MX record changes. This means that Avanan can analyze all historical emails, allowing it to accurately detect user impersonation and email fraud.
Avanan provides full visibility and protection against threats that are inside the Office 365 environment. Their anti-phishing tools utilize machine learning (ML) algorithms to detect malicious emails threats that are missed by email gateways and Microsoft’s default security systems. This makes Avanan a strong solution for organizations looking to implement a multi-layered email security stack, with Avanan working as the last line of defense to detect malicious emails before they reach the email inbox. Avanan use ML models to analyze over 300 indicators of phishing attacks, providing powerful phishing and account compromise detection. They also provide real-time malware and, link and attachment sandboxing, to protect against malicious links and attachments.
For MSPs, Avanan offers a powerful email threat protection within a platform that is easy to deploy and manage. Avanan deploys in less than five minutes, and integrates easily with platforms like Office 365, G Suite, Dropbox and Slack to protect against threats inside these cloud applications. Avanan offers a simplified management console for both MSPs and their end-clients, with simplified onboarding and 24/7 global support. Avanan’s multi-tenant portal allows you to easily manage all users and generate reports on customer activity. Avanan also offer flexible MSP pricing and offers support for clients of all sizes.
Barracuda Total Email Protection is Barracuda’s all in one email protection portfolio, which aims to simplify email security for both MSPs and end clients. Total Email Protection includes Barracuda Essentials, Sentinel, PhishLine and Incident Response in a one stop shop for email security. All four of these modules are managed from a single admin dashboard to create a comprehensive email security platform.
Total Email Protection includes Barracuda’s secure email gateway, with email filtering and spam blocking functionality, as well as encryption, archiving and email continuity. Barracuda Sentinel augments this gateway with protection inside the email inbox, protecting users against targeted email threats like spear-phishing and email compromise. Barracuda PhishLine, also included, is Barracuda’s complete security awareness and phishing simulation solution, helping to train end-users to identify and report suspicious emails.
Barracuda is a popular choice for MSPs looking for an email security solution. They offer a purpose-built MSP platform, with multi-layered security and data protection services. Barracuda provide enablement resources, experience in the channel and scalable solutions for organizations and MSPs of all sizes, as well as fixed-monthly pricing plans for MSP customers.
Hornetsecurity are a fast-growing email security provider, offering an MSP focused email protection suite. A market leader in the European email security space, Hornetsecurity have been growing quickly in the US market, after recent acquisitions of email security services EveryCloud Email Security(US & UK), Spamina (Spain) & ZeroSpam (Canada). Hornetsecurity offer a comprehensive email security platform, offering a secure email gateway along with email archiving and encryption designed to work seamlessly with Office 365.
Hornetsecurity’s 365 Total Protection platform offers a range of email threat protection features for Office 365 users. They provide comprehensive threat detection using multiple email filtering systems to detect spam and malware, powered by Hornetsecurity’s ongoing threat intelligence data. Hornetsecurity guarantees a detection rate of 99.99% for spam and 99.9% for viruses. They also offer an Advanced Threat Protection sandboxing engine which performs dynamic analysis on malicious files to detect malware and ransomware in real time, automatically quarantining malicious emails. Hornetsecurity also provides content controls and compliance features for email, ensuring that IT teams can set customizable policies to ensure employee safety and compliance.
Hornetsecurity offers a comprehensive email platform for service providers. Partners benefit from their strong email security platform, which integrates easily with Office 365 and easy to manage at the client level. Hornetsecurity’s solutions are scalable and have a high availability. Hornetsecurity offers four levels of partnership, which offer different benefits in terms of margins and sales and technical support availability. All Hornetsecurity partners have access to partner discounts, as well as technical and marketing support. Hornetsecurity is a strong email security solution for MSPs, especially those based in Europe looking for a partner-focused solution.
Mailprotector, a child company of Virtual Connect Technologies, is an email security vendor that specializes in email protection products for MSPs. CloudFilter is their email filtering platform that enables MSPs to stop their clients from receiving spam and protect them against viruses, malware and sophisticated social engineering attacks. CloudFilter combines accurate, effective email filtering, granular customization and detailed analytics to secure email communications and ensure that only safe emails reach the end users’ inboxes.
When CloudFilter flags a message as suspicious, it send users a notification that allows them to preview the HTML contents of the message and, if it’s safe, deliver it and whitelist the sender so that future communications from them aren’t blocked. If the email is deemed malicious, users can add the sender to their “blocked” list. This decreases the number of false positives, freeing up IT resources to remediate genuine threats. The CloudFilter platform also offers in-depth reporting and analytics capabilities, which provide each user with regular insights into which emails were quarantined and why, including where it was sent from and where delivery was interrupted. This ensures that users only release emails that are 100% safe into their inboxes.
For MSPs, CloudFilter features detailed administrator logs that enable security teams to see detailed analytics into message scoring and classification, so that they can quickly mitigate any issues. The advanced mailflow status tools monitor delivery in real time and automatically alert the security team to any delivery issues as soon as they’re detected. This enables MSPs to mitigate any problems before their customers are even aware of them. Mailprotector’s CloudFilter platform is a strong solution for MSPs looking to provide their clients with accurate inbox protection. Mailprotector also offer an extensive online knowledge base, as well as dedicated support and training, to ensure that their MSP partners can secure their clients as effectively as possible.
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is Microsoft’s additional security layer to protect Office 365 users against advanced threats. It’s a cloud-based email filtering service that is designed to safe-guard organizations against harmful email links and prevent social engineering attacks from being delivered to users. It also provides reporting and URL trace capabilities that allow admins to gain important visibility into the types of threats facing their organization. Defender also provides protection for safe attachments in Teams and across SharePoint and OneDrive.
Microsoft Defender for Office 365 provides comprehensive threat protection features, including protection against malicious attachments and URLs across O365, including in email, Teams, SharePoint and OneDrive. It also provides policies to prevent the delivery of phishing attacks and provides real-time threat reports. Higher levels of the service provide automated incident response and attack simulations to train users to spot phishing attacks within Office 365.
Despite these threat protection features industry analysts have pointed out that Microsoft Defender has some way to go before it reaches the level of threat protection offered by third party email security solutions. However, Microsoft Defender is a strong solution for MSPs who are providing Office 365 to their clients and are looking for an extra layer of email security to stop malicious links and attachments.
N-able are focused fully on delivering their comprehensive email security suite through channel partners. They offer a powerful cloud-based email security suite, which provides full protection for inbound and outbound email against malicious URLs and attachments, spam and phishing attacks. Mail Assure combines threat intelligence with machine learning to protect against spear-phishing and social engineering attacks, to safe-guard against advanced email threats. N-able works well with Microsoft Office 365, deploying easily into the Office 365 environment and providing full continuity in the event of outages.
N-able’ Mail Assure combines a cloud-based email gateway, 24/7 email continuity and secure archiving to protect email from inbound and outbound threats and give organizations more control over their emails. Their threat intelligence combines data from 23 million mailboxes to detect email threat and provide strong email filtering. They also allow admins to detect abuse via email. Mail Assure allows end users to view, release, blacklist or whitelist messages from their spam quarantine, and allows admins to set customizable email policies from a centralized admin console. Mail Assure supports SPF, DKIM and DMARC to help protect against domain name spoofing.
N-able Mail Assure service partners benefit from a range of features that make managing email security easier for MSPs. Mail Assure provides a multi-tenant interface with a range of pre-defined policies, settings and reports; designed to make it easier to manage your clients. This interface supports multiple languages, allowing you to support customers all over the world. Mail Assure supports custom filtering rules, allowing you to easily manage clients email filtering, and provides advanced searching functionality designed to make it easy to search and view clients email traffic. N-able provides comprehensive support and technical documentation and the service can be fully white labelled to fit your brand. N-able Mail Assure is a good option for MSP customers looking for a powerful email security solution a focus on delivering an easy to manage and customizable platform for service providers.
FAQs
What Are the Most Important Email Security Features for MSPs?
We asked N-able’s Head Security Nerd Gill Langston what the most important email security features are for MSPs. Email protection is one of the core components that MSPs need to offer to their customers, Langston says. Email is often the first way in for many advanced cyber-attacks over the internet, and so having an inbound cloud-based email filtering service to block malicious emails is hugely important to keeping your clients secure.
Many service providers are moving to cloud-based IT services and, with the increase in popularity of cloud-based email suites like Office 365 and Google Workspace (formerly G Suite), cloud-based email security systems are the best option for MSPs. “Having a cloud-based platform means you don’t have to manage any addresses, you can have multiple customers in one console, and you can manage everything from one place.”
Customizability is another important feature in a strong email security platform. MSPs need the ability to configure blanket settings for their clients, Langston says. But it’s also key that end users can fine tune the service themselves, configuring filtering rules and being able to quarantine emails within outlook.
It’s also important that MSPs find a solution with multi-layered threat protection, which goes beyond just spam filtering, but can protect against the sophisticated email threats that are facing organizations today. A strong solution should support delivery technologies like DMARC, SPF and DKIM. These systems help to validate legitimate email senders and protect against domain and brand spoofing. Utilizing new technologies such as machine learning is also important, helping to protect against advanced phishing attacks by heuristically scanning inbound and outbound email.
