CipherTrust to Support Merged SPF and Caller ID Sender Authentication Protocol
May 26th 2004: – CipherTrust, Inc. today announced it will integrate the new protocol arising from the merger of anti-phishing and anti-spoofing protocols Sender Policy Framework (SPF) and Caller ID into the company’s award-winning IronMail appliance. CipherTrust was the first solution provider to introduce e-mail authentication standards into its product offering and is continuing to work with other members of the e-mail ecosystem to define and deploy other email authentication protocols, including Yahoo’s DomainKeys.
“Many other vendors followed CipherTrust’s lead when the company was the first to incorporate SPF into its product and urge its customers to publish their SPF records,” said Meng Wong, primary author of the SPF protocol. “The success of SPF was dependent upon widespread deployment and CipherTrust’s market leadership and significant customer base including 30 percent of the Fortune 100 was a critical component to increasing SPF’s traction and effectiveness. It is encouraging to see market leaders such as AOL and CipherTrust support the merger of SPF and Microsoft’s Caller ID, ensuring the new protocol will experience even more success.”
SPF and Caller ID are anti-spoofing tools that compare the sender domain against the client IP address. Domains publish SPF and Caller ID records to announce the IP addresses of their outbound e-mail servers. As the majority of spam today carries an illegally forged sender address, SPF and Caller ID will help SMTP receivers distinguish legitimate mail from forged spam, worms and viruses. The SPF and Caller ID merged protocol will be used as a data point in IronMail’s Spam Profiler correlation engine to better ensure the deliverability of legitimate e-mail while stopping spam at the gateway.
“Incorporating sender authentication into the fabric of the e-mail architecture is crucial to ensure e-mail remains the critical business communication tool it is,” said CipherTrust chief technology officer Dr. Paul Judge. “CipherTrust was founded on a vision to provide peace of mind in messaging and our support of the SPF and Caller ID merger continues to fulfil the commitment to secure the e-mail architecture of our customers, the world’s leading companies.”
“The convergence of the two proposals is a very positive milestone in the war on spam and brings together the best of both SPF and Caller ID,” said George Webb, group business manager of the Anti-Spam Technology and Strategy group at Microsoft. “We are pleased that leading organisations like CipherTrust are rallying behind the combined Caller ID and SPF proposal to help swiftly bring a new level of spam protection to customers.”
About CipherTrust, Inc.
CipherTrust, Inc. is the market leader in comprehensive email security including best-of-breed spam prevention. The company’s powerful, award-winning IronMail appliance combines the five critical email security components of spam and fraud prevention, virus and worm protection, policy and content compliance, email privacy, and secure email gateway capabilities into a single easy to deploy and manage platform. IronMail protects the messaging systems of more enterprise email users than any other solution, including 30 percent of the Fortune 100. CipherTrust’s investors include Battery Ventures, Greylock, U.S. Venture Partners, Noro-Moseley and Silicon Valley Bank. Headquartered in Atlanta, more information about CipherTrust can be found at www.ciphertrust.com.