Cloud-based email archiving is one of four deployment options businesses have when evaluating email archiving solutions – the others being hardware, software and a hybrid solution. Each option is capable of freeing up space on mail servers, but when it comes to compliance and efficiency there are certain advantages of archiving emails in the cloud.
Compliant Cloud-Based Email Archiving
Compliance will likely be the primary consideration for businesses in regulated industries. In industries such as healthcare, finance and the legal industry, it is necessary for each business to have a disaster recovery plan that includes the restoration of email data in the event of a natural or environmental disaster. This is also a good practice for businesses operating outside of regulated industries to adopt.
The advantage cloud-based email archiving has over other deployment options is that data cannot be stolen, damaged or corrupted in a cloud-based environment as can occur with hardware, software and hybrid deployment options. Consequently, archiving email data onto an on-premise solution does not guarantee a disaster recovery plan will be actionable, whereas email data archived in the cloud can be restored with the click of a mouse.
Archiving Emails in the Cloud Can Resolve Retention Issues
With on-premise software solutions, the usual sequence of events is that archived email data is removed from the mail server and placed in a different location on the same server. Although this sequence improves email management, it does little to free up overall space and – as the volume of a business´s email accumulates – the available space in the archive database is exhausted.
This can create an issue with retention as, once the available space in the archive database is exhausted, the only ways in which more space can be created is by migrating data to a hardware solution or buying a bigger server. Cloud-based email archiving solutions overcome retention issues by expanding dynamically in storage capacity as a business´s email data grows over time.
How Cloud-Based Email Archiving is More Efficient
Solutions for archiving emails in the cloud are typically “set and forget” solutions. This means that once a cloud-based email archiving solution has been deployed, there is no need for IT teams to have maintenance concerns. Depending on the permission levels set, users should be able to retrieve their own lost, misfiled or deleted emails – freeing up IT support for more business-critical activities.
For businesses with a large number of users or users in multiple locations, cloud-based email archiving solutions can also be configured to work across multiple servers and stores. Email data is centralized – accelerating the search and retrieval process, and enabling HR, legal and auditing teams to work more efficiently. This also has time-saving and cost-saving advantages for compliance audits and e-discovery.
Not all Cloud-Based Email Archiving Solutions are the Same
The way in which solutions for archiving emails in the cloud work can make a difference to their levels of compliance and efficiency. To be fully compliant with retention and disaster recovery requirements, emails should be archived as they pass through an email server. With periodic archiving the opportunity exists for an email to be deleted immediately after it has been sent or received with no copy made.
To optimize efficiency, a cloud-based email archiving solution should remove all duplicated content before indexing, compressing and archiving emails. This process makes searches quicker to perform and search results easier to navigate. It will also be an advantage to businesses if their cloud-based solution supports multiple email services via a browser-based portal rather than requiring a plug in for each.
Combatting Email Data Theft with Cloud-Based Email Archiving
Email data theft can cause significant losses for businesses and although the tools to combat email data theft are not exclusive to cloud-based email archiving, archiving emails in the cloud can mitigate the risk of theft by an employee or by an outside source. Of particular importance is the immediate archiving of data so that emails can be restored in the event of a malicious act by an employee or hacker.
Another tool that can help businesses combat email data fraud is tamper-evident audit trails. This tool monitors access to archived email data and helps administrators identify any unusual or client-specific activity. Any archived data that is altered without authorization can be restored so that businesses remain in compliance with industry regulations for the integrity of email data.
Email Data and Compliance with GDPR
Immediate archiving and tamper-evident audit trails are two important factors relating to email data and compliance with GDPR – the EU´s General Data Protection Regulation introduced in May 2018. This regulation affects every organization that collects, processes, shares or retains EU citizens´ personal data and gives EU citizens specific rights over data access, correction and erasure (the “right to be forgotten”).
Under GDPR, businesses have to implement measures to protect data from loss, theft or unauthorized disclosure. The penalties for failing to comply with GDPR can be significant (up to €20 million or 4% or global turnover – whichever is the greater), and the penalties can be applied even if no breach of data has occurred. Therefore – for businesses dealing with EU citizens – a compliant and efficient solution is strongly recommended.
Key Benefits of Cloud Email Archiving
Cloud-based email archiving solutions are not only concerned with securely storing emails for disaster recovery and compliance. Cloud email archiving brings a host of benefits for businesses. Cloud email archiving services will ease the strain on your email server to improve performance and will greatly reduce local storage space. Many businesses slash local storage space by 80% by using a cloud email archiving service. Improved main server performance means the IT department has to spend less time on maintenance. Employees can be given access to their own archive, so they need not bother the IT department every time they lose an email. Cloud email archiving services therefore help to improve productivity in the IT department.
Whenever emails need to be found, fast searches can be performed, greatly reducing the time spent finding emails for audits and eDiscovery. Whenever you receive a right-of-access request, it is easy to search the archive and produce all email data. Cloud email archiving can therefore allow businesses to make huge cost savings.
Beware of Email Archiving Solutions that Use Proprietary Data Formats
Some email archiving solutions use proprietary data formats, which is perfectly fine for archiving emails, but can be a problem if you ever want to change email archiving solutions. You may find that your chosen solution does not live up to expectations for example, or your business needs may change. You need to make sure that it will be an easy process to transfer your archive. When creating a shortlist of email archiving solutions, check the data export options and the data formats supported to avoid any headaches.
ArcTitan Cloud from WebTitan – A Compliant and Efficient Solution for Your Business
ArcTitan Cloud is a cloud-based email archiving solution that contains all the features mentioned above to assist businesses with their compliance obligations in the most efficient manner possible. Our solution for archiving emails in the cloud also helps businesses combat email data theft and prevent the unauthorized alteration of archived email data.
ArcTitan Cloud is a “set and forget” solution that is set up and configured via a browser-based portal with plug-ins available for Microsoft Outlook if required. Because it is a browser-based solution, ArcTitan Cloud is compatible with all operating systems and all leading email services. It can also be configured to support multiple servers for larger businesses.
To enhance security, email data is maintained in an IL5 certified data center with all traffic process via mandatory TLS protocols. However, this high level of security does not affect the solution´s performance. ArcTitan Cloud can deduplicate, compress, index and archive up to 200 emails per second, and search a data store of 30 million emails in less than a second.
Find Out More about Archiving Emails in the Cloud with ArcTitan Cloud
If you are looking into the deployment options for email archiving solutions and have any questions about archiving emails in the cloud, we invite you to contact us and discuss your archiving requirements with one of our team of Sales Technicians. Our Sales Technicians will be happy to answer any questions you have and offer to organize a free demo of ArcTitan in action. Free demos are also available for our web filtering solution, WebTitan, and our cloud based anti spam service, SpamTitan.
Not only will the free demo provide you with the opportunity to see the advantages of cloud-based email archiving, as ArcTitan Cloud does not use proprietary formats, there are no costly or time-consuming data conversions to perform if you subsequently decide to subscribe to our cloud-based email archiving solution.
Contact us today and you could be archiving your emails in the cloud within minutes. If you have an existing data archive, it can be imported quickly and easily, or our Sales Technicians can liaise with your IT team to ensure a seamless deployment. ArcTitan Cloud is not only a complete cloud-based archiving solution, but it guarantees you will never lose a business-critical email again.
