Email Security

In doing research for strategic uses of technology in accounting, I came across an interesting article entitled "Email Security for Small Businesses: Protecting Digital Information." It was an article in the CPA Journal from July of 2006. The article discusses how protecting information used to involve locking drawers and cabinets, but now with the use of email and the Internet, keeping information secure has changed immensely. The article discusses the danger of sending important information through email, due to the lack of security involved. Once that information is sent, it could be forwarded to anyone, including competitors. There is also the possibility of information being stolen off computers that are misplaced, or left unattended.

Fortunately, there are options businesses can take in order to try to prevent this from happening. The article mentions how accounting firms have used encryption and digital rights management (DRM) to safeguard such information from leaving the organization. According to the article, these options are now available to smaller businesses, as oppose to just the large accounting firms. This sort of security technology can delete old emails at a certain date, and apply pass codes for accessing the information so it is only available to certain users. Of course there is no absolute guarantee to these types of security, but it is a step in the right direction to protect client data.

Having had experience at a local accounting firm, I can relate to some of these security issues. We were constantly reminded never to leave our laptop unattended for more than a few minutes at a time, and are never to leave our laptop at a client overnight. The firm I worked for takes very cautious steps toward making sure no information is accessible to anyone outside the company.