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Nowadays, data breaches and data theft are more common than ever before, and businesses are primary targets for hackers to acquire valuable information. That’s why it has become necessary for organizations to encrypt their confidential information.
Since Outlook is a widely used email client for communication, encrypting any confidential MS Outlook emails is necessary. In this blog, we will cover different methods that can be beneficial for anyone looking to encrypt emails in Outlook.
In general, encrypting an email in Outlook means converting the readable plaintext (email message) to a scrambled ciphertext. It’s a straightforward task to decrypt the encrypted message as the recipient with the private key identical to the public key (that was earlier used to encrypt the plaintext) can decipher the message for further reading. Anyone without this private key can see indecipherable text only. MS Outlook supports the following two encryption options:
With the latest Microsoft 365 update, the encryption in Outlook has been improved. For Office 365 subscribers, there is an ‘Encrypt’ button instead of the older Permission button. In this section, we will go through the S/MIME and Office 365 Message Encryption methods to encrypt emails in Outlook.
Before getting started, you must add a certificate to the keychain on your computer. Once you have set up the signing certificate, you’ll need to configure it in Outlook. To do so, follow the below steps:
The next step is to share the certificate with your recipients. Before sharing the certificate, you must send the recipients a digitally signed message to whom you will send encrypted emails. To do so, follow the steps outlined below:
Next, Send the message to the email recipient(s). In the mail body, one can include the instructions so that the recipient(s) can add your certificate to your contact data in their address book and send you a digitally signed message so you can get the certificate as well.
Note that the Public key portion of your certificate is sent, so others can also encrypt what they need to send to you. Due to this, you can decrypt such emails with your Private key.
One can now proceed to send an encrypted email to a recipient. You need their certificate (Public key) to perform this operation. So, if your contacts already have acquired their own encryption certificate and have sent you a digitally signed one from their Outlook client, then follow the below-mentioned steps:
Congratulations! Now you are ready to send encrypted emails in Outlook to this contact.
To send an encrypted mail, to follow the below steps:
Caution: The S/MIME encryption method is prone to Message Takeover Attack. This allows the attacker to add their own signatures Impersonating you. It is to note that the attacker can only decrypt the replies to the original mail but not the original email message.
This method allows users to send an encrypted email to any Outlook or a third-party email client. This method only works with your Office 365 subscription (Exchange online). The only downside of this method is that the receiver has to perform a few extra steps every time they receive an encrypted email message.
To encrypt, follow the steps outlined below:
When you send encrypted emails in Outlook using OME, your recipient gets an email from you without the actual content but with a link to the email. Upon clicking this link, your receiver will be taken to a webpage where they must sign in with an Outlook work or school account or with a one-time passcode. The former option will only work for receivers with an active Office 365 subscription. If your receiver chooses the latter authentication option, it will take them to another webpage. A one-time password will be sent to their registered email account, which they must enter in the provided text box on this webpage.
Due to numerous reasons, your password-protected and encrypted emails in Outlook can get corrupted. In such troubling situations, Kernel for Outlook PST Repair could become your beacon of light as it can quickly repair heavily corrupted encrypted emails in Outlook and password-protected messages. You can also use it to accomplish various PST-related tasks, such as repairing PST files and recovering deleted messages and attachments. In addition, this tool can save the recovered PST to DBX, MBOX, MSG, EML, TXT, RTF, HTML, and MHTML formats. One can also import the recovered PST files to Office365, email servers, and Web mails.
In this article, we have extensively looked at the working of the two most common methods to encrypt emails in Outlook. In the S/MIME encryption method, we have discussed how to add the encryption certificate, which is required before sending the encrypted email to Outlook. Similarly, we have also discussed the working of the Office 365 Message Encryption method to secure Microsoft 365 data.
At last, we have also recommended an automated Kernel for Outlook PST Repair tool, which you can use if the encrypted emails in Outlook and their attachments get corrupted.
The article on encrypting email in Outlook was a great resource for me, as I have been concerned about the security of my email messages. The author did an excellent job of breaking down the steps into manageable chunks and providing clear explanations. Thank You!