Email security was the topic of discussion at another Open-Xchange sponsored TES event held last Thursday in the fantastic setting of Old Trafford Stadium, the home of Manchester United. BT, TalkTalk and Plusnet, three of the largest ISPs in the UK, had delegates in attendance along with Halon and Cloudmark. This intimate group discussed the challenges facing email security as it stands today and how they could collaborate going forward to improve the state of affairs. You can read more about the event at the TES website.

The Trusted Email Services project is an open, non-commercial industry effort to raise awareness around current email security threats and promote the deployment of technologies to address them, particularly cryptographic techniques to secure the submission, transport and storage of E-mail messages over the Internet using the DNS root as the trust anchor.

The project specifically targets, as a primary audience, the ISPs, telecom and hosting companies in each country, organizing a series of round-table meetings where product owners and technical experts responsible for E-mail can take part in a meaningful conversation; ideally, these companies are best suited to build the critical mass that would prompt general adoption of any new practice.

The project was initiated in Autumn 2015 by Open-Xchange, the maker of Dovecot, OX App Suite and PowerDNS, with the participation of other E-mail, DNS and security vendors, such as Halon and VadeSecure. However, no product placement or sales pitch is allowed in TES, and meetings only focus on presenting the issues and discussing relevant technologies and best practices. Before discussion is opened to all participants, introductory presentations are offered by technical experts from the supporting organizations and companies (e.g. Jakob Schluyter, one of the authors of DANE TLSA, presented at the Stockholm event).