E-mail is a staple in most of our technology-driven lives, but you should be aware of the risks when you look to protect your data. Part of the problem is the way e-mail works.
When you send an email, your e-mail is routed through two mail servers – yours and your recipients. It also has to go through every other ‘hop’ point – the connections between your mail server and theirs – across the internet. A copy then gets saved on that end server, where the security is out of your hands.
Sensitive data just isn’t meant to be sent or saved this way. Unless you want the controller of your recipient’s mail server, or a hacker along the way, to be able to peek at your data, you should avoid e-mail for anything critical.
If it’s impossible to avoid using e-mail, you should look to use encryption to protect the data being sent. Find out how you can encrypt your emails here.