How to do Email Security Audit & Ensure Your Defenses Are Harder To Break Than Pee Wee Herman’s Chair

Email Security Audit, Threat Detection, and Cybersecurity Risk Assessment are hot terms for a reason. They’re your bread and butter in a world where threats constantly evolve.

Here’s the no-beat-around-the-bush truth: email is the #1 entryway into your systems. It’s the lifeblood of your business, no conversation about it. If you’re managing your business and not taking your email security dead serious, it’s practically the equivalent of leaving your car door wide open and parking saying: “please steal my car.”

Below, I walk you through doing an email security audit, reinforcing your defenses, and give you an insight into what we do at PJ Networks, safeguarding businesses just like yours.

Why Is Email Security Audit Important?

Vulnerability goes hand in hand with email. You’re an appealing target to hackers because emails contain everything from your credit card information to your business bank details to your password’s blueprint.

Here’s why doing regular audits is so necessary:

• Email attacks grow every year. Even if you drill your staff, it’s only a matter of time until someone slips up. Audits show you how close you indeed are to ultimate preparedness.
• Laws and Regulations. GDPR, PHIPAA, and other regulatory bodies do require strong email practices. The absolute last thing you want is your business’ doors shutdown because of a breach.
• Data prevention manifests multiple ways. Your email is just one of the more accessible targets.

Luckily, audits show you where to plug in the leaks; last year’s trench wars are passé. Email threats shift with every new dawn.

An email audit is essentially a welfare check for corporations that want to avoid being robbed.

How to Conduct a Security Audit

The security audit is as scary as you make it. What you need to know is where to look. I’ve handled it for you in numerous digestible steps, which you can do yourself or use to inquire into your IT team or MSP.

Would you like to follow these steps?

First, check your policies.

• Do we have strong password requirements in place and enforce multi-factor authentication?
• Who has access to sensitive emails?
• Do our users have “security awareness training”, and can they spot a phishing email?
• No policies or outdated ones put you at risk. It is like playing Cyber Roulette if you do not have rules.

Second, inspect your email servers.

Review the configurations.

• SPF, DKM, and DMARC: They all are setting tools that validate your emails to make sure that they come from you and not from a phisher who pretends to be you.
• Are they missed or misconfigured? You’re looking at a big red flag!

Third, analyze email logs and alerts.

• Check login attempt information
• Identify emails with or without malicious links and files
• Look for bad login patterns
• Evaluate your email platform

Install a secure platform such as Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, or other similar services. Regularly check spam filters, encryption, and blocked file types or suspicious email attachments.

Test staff members.

The security of your employees is utmost because they usually are the potential weak link. Set a mock test for phishing. It’s a simple way to see how your team works under pressure.

• Are they sending shaky messages?
• Do they click unsafe links?
• Develop effective training from the results.

This makes sure they can’t read any email other than what was sent to them.

• TLS
• End-to-end encryption tools – dependent on the platform

Block Dangerous File Types

Users can’t receive or send:

• *.exe
• *.jar
• *.bat
• * any zip file from an unknown sender

These contain viruses. It is better safe than sorry.

Deploy Anti-Phishing and Threat Detection Tools

Nowadays, email platforms have filters based on machine-learning. They detect:

• Any suspicious link
• Any lookalike domain
• Email from a fake sender

Turn it on. Customize it based on your necessity. Each false positive detected prior to the worse, is better.

Regular Staff Training

Every 3-6 months, gather your team. Train them on how to:

• Detect a phishing email
• Report a menace
• Not get fish food

People are your shields and barriers.

Schedule Regular Cybersecurity Risk Assessments

Make it your habit. Avoid waiting for things to break. Have Cybersecurity Risk Assessment of the email within a quarter or biannually. You will be aware of what is working and not.

Summary: PJ Networks’ Email Security Audit Services

It’s too much? Of course. That’s why PJ Networks provide you with an Email Security Audit.

Analyze it closely:

• Email setting configuration
• Users’ discerning history
• Any suspected work
• Former breach indicators

Overview of Threat Detection

Referring to human and automated analysis, we identify:

• Present threats you are hiding from
• Pierces in your filter
• Your employees’ harmful demeanor

Cybersecurity Risk Assessment Reports

It is not only papers filled with bars; it’s a simple report with our signature and a commentary that shows you:

• Your protection gaps
• How we can make it up
• What demands urgent and what can wait

Ongoing Plans of Monitoring

More than from the beginning, after your scan is the end, we can stick with you.

The best part? We do it without disrupting your workflow.

Conclusion

Cybersecurity isn’t a one-time checklist. It’s a living, breathing process. But the good news is — you’ve already made the first step by reading this blog.

Start with these simple three steps: audit what you have now, identify weaknesses and implement the protections. Whither you DIY it or bring experts like us at PJ Networks—take some action. Every day you wait, attacks only grow more risks.

Strong email security isn’t attached once; it protects your data but your brand and your clients and you’re well your career. Start with Email Security Audit, invest in Threat Detection, and conduct regular Cybersecurity Risk Assessment before you become the next headline.