Mediaset Stops Viruses and Spam on Jumpy Email with Memova Anti-Abuse from Critical Path
May 19, 2005 Critical Path, Inc. (Nasdaq: CPTH), a leading provider of messaging software and services, today announced that Mediaset SpA, one of the world’s largest broadcasting groups, has deployed Memovaâ„? Anti-Abuse to protect the users of its consumer email service Jumpy against viruses, spam and other malicious attacks. Mediaset is one of a host of service providers that are deploying Critical Path’s new Memova Anti-Abuse solution, including Postecom in Italy, O2 in Germany, Hemro Associates in the UK, and La Poste in France. Memova Anti-Abuse enables service providers to stop abuse and provide a better email experience for consumers, while minimizing operational costs.
Like most email service providers today, Mediaset’s Jumpy service receives high volumes of abuse traffic; in fact, prior to implementing Memova Anti-Abuse, more than 70 percent of Jumpy’s inbound email traffic was abuse. With such high volumes of abuse traffic, the cost of preventing viruses and spam from reaching users was getting out of control, and user churn resulting from abuse was a growing concern.
In an effort to improve customer satisfaction, Mediaset turned to Memova Anti-Abuse – a highly efficient, cost-effective solution designed by Critical Path specifically for service providers. Memova Anti-Abuse is a plug-and-play anti-virus, anti-spam appliance that combines unique traffic management capabilities with leading-edge content analysis. Memova Anti-Abuse sits at the network gateway and stops malicious attacks, viruses and spam before they can enter or exit Mediaset’s messaging systems.
Memova Anti-Abuse identified 70% of Mediaset’s Jumpy email traffic as abuse, resulting in a 95% reduction in spam. Most importantly, Mediaset was able to achieve these results at a much lower cost than it could have with alternative solutions. Because Memova Anti-Abuse stops the bulk of abuse with traffic management alone, the number of email messages that require more costly content analysis is minimized. Hence, Memova provides a highly effective anti-abuse solution at minimal costs. Mediaset has been able to ensure critical up-time for its Jumpy email services, reduce operational loads and prevent outbound abuse.
“Memova Anti-Abuse has dramatically improved the email experience for our users” said Emanuele Callioni, Mediaset Service Platform Manager for the Jumpy Portal. “With the solution seamlessly integrated with our existing messaging platform, we avoid the risk of bottlenecks. We’ve reduced spam by more than 95%, and at the same time, we’ve lowered our storage requirements by 40%, and we are doing all of this at one-third the cost of alternative anti-abuse solutions. Memova has been great for our business.”
Other service providers who are deploying Memova Anti-Abuse expect similar results. Postecom, O2, Hemro Associates and La Poste will all deploy the solution this Spring/Summer. In addition, five other service providers have selected and/or deployed Memova Anti-Abuse since the product’s launch just five months ago.
“With multiple layers of defense and strong traffic management, Memova Anti-Abuse reduces a service provider’s abuse-related costs more than other solutions can by minimizing the need for costly content analysis and filtering,” said Mike Serbinis, CTO, Critical Path. “In addition to lowering costs, the solution gives service providers the opportunity to increase revenue by offering premium anti-abuse services.”
Memova Anti-Abuse provides a full range of administrative controls that enable service providers to easily customize anti-abuse services at the domain, class-of-service and subscriber levels. As such, service providers can provide a basic level of anti-spam and anti-virus protection for all users, while simultaneously offering added protection as a premium service option for high-value subscribers.
About Mediaset SpA
Based in Italy, Mediaset (http://www.mediaset.it) is one of the largest broadcasting groups in the world and the owner of the online portal Jumpy (http://www.jumpy.it). Jumpy provides a rich, full-service consumer online portal offering news and entertainment content, as well as a full range of online services including chat, message boards, mobile alerts and email. Jumpy provides free email service to more than 500,000 active subscribers leveraging the Critical Pathâ„? Messaging Server.
About Critical Path, Inc.
Critical Path’s Memovaâ„? solutions provide a new and improved email experience for millions of consumers worldwide, helping mobile operators, broadband and fixed-line service providers unlock the potential of email in the mass market. Memovaâ„? Mobile gives consumers instant, on-the-go access to the messages that matter most. Featuring industry-leading anti-spam and anti-virus technology, Memovaâ„? Anti-Abuse protects consumers against viruses and spam. Memovaâ„? Messaging provides consumers with a rich email experience, enabling service providers to develop customized offerings for high-speed subscribers. Headquartered in San Francisco with offices around the globe, Critical Path’s messaging solutions are deployed by more than 200 service providers throughout the world. More information is available at www.criticalpath.net.
Forward-Looking Statements:
This press release contains forward-looking statements by the Company and its executives regarding the performance of our product and service offerings, the ability of our customers to achieve cost savings and improve revenues in the provision of services, industry trends, market and customer requirements, the ability of our products and services to meet the business needs of our customers, the market for products and services like ours and the performance of our senior management in achieving strategic goals. The words and expressions “look forward to,” “will,” “expect,” “plan,” “believe,” “seek,” “strive for,” “anticipate,” “hope,” “estimate” and similar expressions are intended to identify the Company’s forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated. These risks include, but are not limited to, our evolving business strategy and the emerging and changing nature of the market for our products and services, our ability to deliver on our sales objectives, the ability of our technology and our competitors’ technologies to address customer demands, changes in economic and market conditions, and software and service design defects. These and other risks and uncertainties are described in more detail in the Company’s filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (www.sec.gov) made from time to time including Critical Path’s Annual Report on Form 10-K/A for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2003, its Quarterly Reports on Forms 10-Q for the fiscal quarters ended March 31, 2004, June 30, 2004 and September 30, 2004, Current Reports on Form 8-K, as may be amended from time to time, and all subsequent filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (www.sec.gov). The Company makes no commitment to revise or update any forward-looking statements in order to reflect events or circumstances after the date any such statement is made.