To English teachers and marketers, Google hit its highpoint in 2006, when lexicographers – the people who write and edit the dictionary - officially listed google as a verb.
For IT professionals, Google has been a driving force in the tech field since it arrived on the scene in the late 1990’s. Its rapid growth has included acquisitions, partnerships, and a chain of products that go beyond its Google Search claims to fame.
Google Drive, Google Docs, Google Sheets, Google Slides, Google Calendar, and of course, Gmail gave the world a new way to look at workplace productivity, take cloud computing to a new level. When Google rebranded its apps as G-Suite in 2016, its primary focus was Workplace. And, as the wildly popular G-Suite evolved over the years and more offerings were added, the focus on productivity began to bend in the direction of collaboration. All of this brings us to where we are today – with the recent 2020 rebranding of G-Suite to Google Workspace.
While the world welcomes the many marvels of Google Workspace, there is one area that lacks considerably – email security that prevents phishing attacks. Why is that a big deal? Consider the following:1
- Gmail remains the most popular email platform with over 1.8 billion users worldwide.
- Gmail owned 43% of the email service market share in 2020.
- Gmail accounts for 27% of all email opens.
- 75% of all Gmail users access their email on mobile devices.
- 61% of 18-29-year-olds use Gmail.
- An average Gmail account is worth around $3,588.85.
- 4 billion emails are sent and received daily in 2020.
This doesn’t mean that Google Workspace doesn’t come without security measures. They employ Transport Layer Security and strong encryption, and they let customers specify their own Sender Policy Framework (SPF) records and cryptographically mark email with DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM). But is that enough? No.
Similarly, a recent attempt at combatting the world of cybercrime in for form of phishing attacks is Google’s PhishAlarm®. According to Google, “PhishAlarm® is a Gmail add-on that allows users to alert security and incident response teams to suspected phishing emails.“2 Okay, but that’s after the fact. Why wasn’t that phishing email caught before it arrived at an employee’s desk? And what about the 47% of users who are found to click on malicious links?3 That is the part that’s alarming.
Let’s take a moment to revisit one of the statistics listed above. 75% of all Gmail users access their email on mobile devices.1 The problem here is that most email phishing solutions don’t work on mobile devices, including the email security that comes with Google Workspace. There is one exception that works alongside (well, downstream from) Google Workspace to help ensure users aren’t getting phished.
INKY is that exception. To truly have a handle on phishing threats, you need a third party’s assistance. INKY offers a relentlessly effective level of security, capable of detecting and stopping phishing threats and similar cybercrimes before anyone becomes a victim. Using computer vision, artificial intelligence, and machine learning, INKY provides a level of ingenuity that is unlike other email security platforms. INKY sees things the way humans do, recognizing logos, brand colors, email signatures, and more — but it also sees the millions of things humans can’t, spotting imposters by as little as a pixel. INKY blocks malicious emails, many of which Google Workspace’s security can’t. INKY also delivers a simple banner on the top of every email – desktop and mobile- that alerts readers of dangerous and suspicious emails.
There is no denying the benefits Google Workspace brings to businesses worldwide. Their focus is productivity and collaboration. Ours is email phishing prevention. And the two go together perfectly.
Learn more about Maintaining Email Security in Google Workspace and call us for a free demonstration of our email phishing prevention software.
INKY® is the emerging hero in the war against phishing. An award-winning cloud-based email security solution, INKY® prevents the most complex phishing threats from disrupting or even immobilizing your company’s day-to-day business operations. Using computer vision, artificial intelligence, and machine learning, INKY® is the smartest investment you can make in the security of your organization. INKY® is a proud winner of the NYCx Cybersecurity Moonshot Challenge and finalist in the 2020 RSAC Innovation Sandbox Competition. Learn more about INKY® or request an online demonstration today.
1Source: https://techjury.net/blog/gmail-statistics/
2Source: https://workspace.google.com/marketplace/app/phishalarm/939483390031