Abnormal Security Portal Provides Comprehensive Email Security Management. We have access to a web portal provided by Abnormal Security. This portal grants us complete visibility into how Abnormal Security analyzes our incoming email. We can see everything it catches, how it classifies the emails as malicious, legitimate, etc., and the reasoning behind the classification. The portal is well-organized with dedicated sections for different threat types. We can easily identify account takeover attempts, vendor fraud attempts, and other threats. A particularly valuable feature is the search and respond functionality. In the past, we've encountered situations where employees accidentally sent out sensitive information or messages that shouldn't have been distributed. The portal allows us to quickly locate these emails and remove them from everyone's inbox, including deleted items. This ensures the emails vanish completely and never reach the intended recipients. Furthermore, the portal empowers us to manage our email security preferences. We can whitelist trusted senders and create custom blocklists for unwanted emails, providing a high level of control over our email environment. While Abnormal Security has been effective in detecting a wide range of email threats, some emails have slipped through. To address this, we've educated our users. If they suspect spam, phishing, or an unusual email, they can report it directly through the "Report" button in Outlook which forwards to Abnormal, or by forwarding it to the "phishing" email address. This triggers a deeper analysis by Abnormal to identify any missed threats. According to our year-long data, users have submitted over 1,500 emails from 121 employees. Abnormal identified 4 percent as malicious and 9 percent as spam, with the remaining 87 percent deemed safe. These statistics indicate that Abnormal doesn't catch everything. However, by fostering a user base that remains vigilant and reports suspicious emails, we can leverage Abnormal's deep analysis to further enhance our email security. During the pilot period, Abnormal Security's benefits became clear. We encountered an ongoing account takeover that we were initially unaware of. However, as Abnormal Security ran, it helped us organize and identify threats effectively. Feedback from the field has been very positive compared to our previous vendor. With our previous vendor, we received four daily emails notifying users about quarantined emails. These notifications cluttered inboxes and created confusion. There were instances where legitimate malware was quarantined, but the user received a message like "This email was quarantined for you. Do you want to investigate or recover it?" Unaware of the potential threat, some users might release the email, believing it to be a false positive. This could lead to compromising their credentials or infecting their computer. Abnormal Security takes a different approach. They automatically hide suspicious emails, preventing them from reaching user inboxes. This eliminates confusion and protects users from inadvertently engaging with malicious content. We encounter AI in various ways. For example, it can be involved in filtering emails. For example, if I am receiving an email in my inbox that I prefer not to see there every day. I might move it to my promotions folder. Conversely, an email might land in promotions that I want to see in my inbox, perhaps because it's considered graymail. In that case, I can move it back to my inbox. The AI can learn from my actions and apply those preferences in the future. AI also plays a crucial role in defending against certain cyberattacks. Traditional methods might not be sufficient to catch these threats. AI can analyze incoming emails for a multitude of factors, performing a kind of predictive analysis on potential threats. These factors might include a sense of urgency in the email's tone, an email supposedly from the CEO but with an unrecognized sender address, or a domain that's a month old. Humans might not readily pick up on such red flags, but AI can effectively identify them. My colleagues tell me that since we implemented this change, the number of attacks has decreased. I can confirm this by checking the dashboard, which shows the current attack volume. Even more importantly, by filtering out greymail into a promotions folder, everyone saves time by not having to sort through irrelevant emails in their inboxes. There have been fewer IT tickets lately concerning suspicious activity. People used to report things like clicking on something malicious or questioning if an email was spam. Now, if something seems abnormal, it's sent directly to the Abnormal activity queue. Previously, we'd receive frequent reports about things like fake CEO emails or phishing attempts, but those types of tickets are becoming rare in our help desk. Previously, we used a much more affordable email security solution. While Abnormal Security costs more, it outperforms or at least matches the capabilities of its competitors. We trialed Barracuda, but their pricing was prohibitive. Even if they lowered their prices now, I wouldn't consider them. Mimecast and Proofpoint, the other options we explored, were priced similarly. However, Abnormal's setup is significantly easier to use. While the initial configuration involves integrating it with our Microsoft 365 environment, Abnormal's day-to-day operation, configuration, and fine-tuning are much simpler compared to the other products.
