Thursday, October 7, 2010

How secure is your fax sending?

For a corporation that might have a lot of employees traditional faxing presents a number of security challenges:

• If left unattended, the sensitive information contained in the fax can be intercepted by a third party.
• Fax machines often save copies of received faxes internally, making it possible for anyone who has access to the fax machine to print out additional copies of the fax content.

• Fax machines generally print out the transmitted messages on paper, which could be placed in an insecure location, if not destroyed.

An answer to this fax security challenge is safe Internet faxing, namely the registered fax feature patented by Popfax.com. Even though any Internet fax service is much more secure than traditional faxing, due to online storage of faxes on secure servers and online fax transmission via highly secured HTTPS websites, the registered fax feature includes a legal document that guarantees both the fax delivery and its integrity. The special features of this service are as follows:

– The sending is performed online, using a secured connection and an account provided by the Internet fax provider.
– The fax document is digitally signed using non-reversible cryptography elements and the signature is then printed on the last page of the document for facsimile transmission.
– The recipient receives the fax document with the unique password and digital signature to access the file and to validate its authenticity. Consequently, no one except the receiver will have access to this fax.
– The sender receives an email notification and a transmission report, confirming the fax delivery. In this way, the delivery and the fax authenticity is guaranteed, the fax content cannot be modified, viewed or accessed by a third party.
– The sender and the receiver can check the authenticity of the registered fax at any time in a secured web interface, as the fax is stored for a long period. Moreover, this document can be used as legal evidence in case of dispute between the parties.

Whether you deal with sensitive financial data, patient health information, judicial papers or other privileged information, secure internet fax solutions offer an assurance that the contents of your fax transmissions are safeguarded.