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SECURING AND OPTIMIZING MICROSOFT EXCHANGE:

Leveraging Defense in Depth to Protect Your Groupware Platform.

INTRODUCTION
In a recent survey conducted by Osterman Research, Messaging Security and Market Trends, 20052008, over
60 percent of respondents identified growth in email storage requirements and spam as the two very serious
problems currently facing their enterprises.
Escalating volumes of spam and viruses, along with evolving threats like spyware and phising, pose serious challenges
to the security and stability of groupware networks. This barragespam, viruses, Denial of Service (DoS), dictionarystyle attacks, and address harvestingdirected specifically at groupware networks, places the email network,
employee lists, customer relationship data, directories and other corporate knowledge all at risk. To keep highly
utilized groupware environments operating at maximum efficiency, administrators typically deploy additional
servers dedicated to security processing, management, storage and quarantine. Investing in and administering these
additional servers make this a prohibitive strategy given the certain growth in email volumes.
Spam, viruses and other attacks are only one facet of the problem. As a result of corporate restructuring and mergers
and acquisitions, multiple groupware, email and directory solutions are another source of groupware complexity.
Effectively administering and securing the flow of mail in complex and often heterogeneous environments is taxing
on IT resources and leads to less than desired quality of service.

Securing Exchange With the

Next-generation Architecture.
This paper describes how, with the right architecture,
email security solutions can be used to secure Microsoft
Exchange and other groupware, while enabling them
to work more efficiently and reliably. The end result:
a greater ROI on the messaging network.
Groupware solutions, including Microsoft Exchange, Lotus
Domino, Novell GroupWise, and others, are well suited
for internal collaboration. They allow employees to pool

Sendmail, Inc.

resources on projects, improve teamwork and enhance

knowledge management. Groupware solutions are highly
utilized, from queuing and storing inbound, outbound and
internal messaging, to providing calendaring and other
collaboration functions, groupware servers are a mission
critical resource in the enterprise and are in demand 24/7.
But for all their benefits, groupware applications were
designed prior to the explosion in Internet email and
without anticipation of outside threats, not to mention
rapidly evolving regulatory requirements. Relying solely
on the security capabilities of groupware to protect the
email network can seriously compromise security and
significantly increase the server load, limiting the number
of users each can support.

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Exchange and other groupware solutions also require

a significant IT investment. These costs include licensing,
user and administrative support, and processing and
storage capacity. In all, IT departments are under constant
pressure to keep groupware functioning seamlessly,
while keeping expenditures under control.

SYNOPSIS
This paper discusses the problems associated with
groupware security and stability, and describes an email
security architecture that ensures a reliable and secure
email network. It outlines the optimal approach based on
the Defense in Depth strategy, a practical application of
best practices from Sendmails extensive experience at
Fortune 100 enterprises. Applying this strategy to email
protection provides a comprehensive set of capabilities
deployed in layers at each security zone. It assures that
capabilities such as perimeter defense, AS/AV filtering,
content policy enforcement, quarantining, internal email
management, and optimal routing work in concert
to virtually eliminate unwanted mail and provide the
enterprise with a cost-effective solution to securely
defend and optimize their Exchange or other groupware
environment.

A secure email architecture aims to protect groupware

from constantly evolving threats transported by email, and
to prevent the constant escalation of costs. To optimize
the message processing network, some large enterprises
use an approach known as Defense in Depth. This multilayered approach uses gateway components deployed
in the DMZ to protect the enterprise email network from
connection-level attacks and most invalid traffic. The next
layer of components deployed in the secure network
manages policies and provides end-user services to
further reduce unwanted traffic and manage internal email
between groupware servers and/or domains.

Sendmail, Inc.

This architectural approach to email security takes

into account the need for specific capabilities, as well
as the security risks associated with those capabilities.
For example: components dealing with connections
from/to email hosts belong at the edge of the network
in the DMZ, but they cannot include any sensitive user
data that can be compromised or serve as an attack
vector. Components managing sensitive data (e.g.,
directories, internal policies) or requiring end-user access
(e.g., quarantine) should be deployed on a protected
internal corporate network rather than exposed to the
penetration risks inherent in the DMZ.
Following are the key requirements for securing
groupware and increasing its ROI. Starting with email
gateway defense, they work in concert to reduce
unwanted messages from the gateway to the mailbox.
In total they provide Defense in Depth and secure and
optimize the complete messaging infrastructure. The
result is a greater ROI on the installed groupware platform.

High performance, high availability mail transfer

agent (MTA)

Connection control for detecting and regulating

unwanted or suspect SMTP connections

Flexible options for anti-spam and anti-virus
filtering
Policy enforcement for corporate and regulatory
compliance
End-user quarantine facility with personal
delivery filters (e.g., allow- and block-lists)
Directory information integrated into the email
network at multiple points (e.g., connection
control, routing, policy, etc.)
Unified management and reporting of the
message processing network
Clustering capabilities for load balancing
and failover to enhance reliability
Integration with backend groupware solutions

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Groupware Servers Are Vulnerable to

Overload Attacks.
Each groupware server performs multiple queries to
resolve addresses, deliver or bounce messages. Typically,
the Exchange server communicates with a local directory
or centralized directory server performing DNS queries
to process a message. Often in these environments, the
catalog server and DNS server are on the same machine,
which means that each invalid message requires additional
processing on a server that may also be handling other
types of user requests.
In Exchange, for example, as the volume of mail being
delivered to the groupware servers increases, queries
processed by the catalog servers also increases. As a result, if
for any reason the groupware server sees the catalog server
as busy or unavailable, the groupware server takes its mailbox
stores offlinepreventing users from accessing their email.
Today, faced with dramatically increasing email volumes,
many organizations have responded by deploying multiple
groupware servers and catalog servers to ensure good
performance and high availability. Because of the certain
growth in email this strategy is unsustainable, especially in
light of limited IT budget and administrative resources.

Clustering to reliably queue email if/when

groupware servers are offline for maintenance or

other reasons
Scanning engines to capture and quarantine
spam and viruses
Policy enforcement for inbound and outbound
messaging for corporate governance and
regulatory compliance
Behind the DMZ and within the secure portion of
the corporate network, Defense in Depth uses these
additional techniques:

Directory validation for optimized routing

and policy capabilities using a centralized,
messaging-only directory
Quarantine in an end-user accessible facility
Additional scanning for spam and virus detection
Automated directory synchronization with
a broad range of corporate LDAP and non-LDAP
data sources
Policy enforcement for granular control over
internal corporate and regulatory compliance
initiatives
With a Defense in Depth strategy in place, the following
product capabilities work seamlessly together to shape
the optimal email security solution for groupware
optimization.

Enabling Defense in Depth.

To deliver the best possible security and performance for
email and groupware networks leading enterprises are
adopting a Defense in Depth strategyarchitectural
techniques for providing end-to-end email security from
the gateway to the mailbox. Defense in Depth utilizes
multiple techniques for defense at the gateway:

Connection control to identify, redirect and

prevent DoS and DHA attacks

Directory validation against a secure, highly
optimized, read-only directory replica for
connection regulation
Routing controls to withstand spikes in
incoming connections
Sendmail, Inc.

A Robust Mail Transfer Agent (MTA).

The MTA is the foundation of Internet emaila routing
infrastructure specifically designed to deliver security,
reliability and scalability. Enterprises with high message
volumes run the risk of security issues, performance
degradations, and lower availability in their email and
groupware networks by deploying unproven and
proprietary MTAs. These MTAs were designed to handle
cleaner, internally-generated and routed email, which can
be easily-overloaded by a variety of Internet-based attacks,
malformed email, or email addressed to invalid or nonexistent recipients.
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Standards-based MTAs provide enterprises more flexibility

because they are tried and tested and deliver more security
expertise through the collective knowledge of peer reviews
and the support of user communities.
In addition, the MTA must provide extensibility to
accommodate a wide range of security plug-ins such as
anti-spam and anti-virus solutions, policy management
and gateway defense solutions. For example: A popular
MTA extension mechanism used by numerous commercial
and open source solutions is the industry standard Mail
Filter (milter) API first developed in the Sendmail MTA. This
capability arms the enterprise with the flexibility to select
from a broad range of anti-spam and anti-virus solutions,
integrate best-of-breed compliance and encryption
engines, and be well positioned to adopt new innovative
approaches to emerging email threats and other needs.
The MTA must be capable of managing enterprise-level
volumeincluding withstanding spikes in connections due
to normal traffic variations and DoS attacksand know
how to optimally route mail to the appropriate mailstore.
The MTA must support high-availability clustering and
configurations that re-route messages through alternate
paths when necessary. For example: in the event of a
network failure at the primary MTA, an alternate MTA
should intelligently accept and queue messages for delivery
until the primary mail environment becomes available or
the redundant environment is ready for routing.
In large enterprise environments, routing between various
groupware networks inevitably becomes more complex as
the network grows in number of domains, users, locations
and administrators. Mergers and acquisitions often add
disparate networks and applications, further increasing
this complexity. Enterprises often deploy a dedicated
MTA to manage this complexity, optimizing network
utilization, reducing message hops and delivery times,
and making it easy to administer.
To augment the MTA, and eliminate hardcoding of
frequently changing configurations, optimal email
environments incorporate directory-based routing,
which enables more efficient routing decisions and
is easier to maintain and update. For example: using
Sendmail, Inc.

directory information to route messages to the proper

mailhub or mailstore the first time, every time; or
accessing an alias list stored in the directory to avoid
bouncing a message.

Connection Control for Monitoring

and Regulating the Connection.
Connection control means actively monitoring
connections to the mail gateway server at the SMTP level.
With connection control, the server looks for irregularities
or attacks, and makes a decision about accepting or
rejecting a new external connection. When a malicious
connection is detectedsuch as a denial-of-service,
spam or directory attackthe connection is dropped,
throttled back to a slower rate, or permanently blocked.
This prevents unwanted messages from ever reaching the
server, eliminating the need for CPU-intensive content
scanning, directory queries, generation and queuing of a
bounce message, etc.
Without Connection Control
Internet

100,000 inbound messages

representing 10,000 connections

Exchange SMTP
BridgeHead 1

Exchange SMTP
BridgeHead 2
Receiving 100,000 messages

Exchange User
Mailbox Stores

After AD
verification
messages are mailed
to user mailbox

100,000 address
lookups
Active Directory
Environment

In this example, 10,000 connections represent 100,000 messages intent on

reaching the mailstore. Without connection control security in front of the
groupware environment there is no buffer to protect Microsoft Exchange
and Active Directory from unwanted messages.

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The standard attack profile for spammers is a massmail delivery, without message queuing. By rejecting
connections with this profile, the number of messages
entering the email network is dramatically reduced,
typically by over 50%. By monitoring all the traffic
connecting to an MTA and throttling back as needed,
effective connection control protects the email network
and groupware applications from spam, viruses, and
denial-of-service attacks. Because nearly all malicious
connections are rejected, resource usage is increased
on the spammers system (queuing) instead of the
corporate groupware environment. In most cases, spam
servers are configured to give up on a receiving MTA if
the connection is slow or repeatedly dropped, and move
on to a different target.
With secure directory integration, connection control
is further augmented by tapping into up-to-date
directory data to reject invalid addresses, regardless
of the connection profile. A connection generating
messages that rapidly exceed a threshold of undeliverable
addresses is likely being used for a dictionary-style attack
or directory harvesting. Detecting and dropping such
connections during the early stages of an attack (based on
a configurable threshold) provides significant protection
of sensitive address information and eliminates the load it
would generate if allowed to reach the groupware servers.
By terminating or throttling back incoming connections
and rejecting messages with invalid addresses, effective
connection control reduces the volume of messages
entering the AS/AV/Content/Policy filtering and
groupware environment, significantly reducing resource
usage. Checking for invalid addresses at the network
perimeter also eliminates outbound bounce messages
from the groupware server. The result is a massive
reduction in network overhead, filtering servers, and
number of backend mailstores.

Sendmail, Inc.

Flexible Options for Anti-spam

and Anti-virus Filtering.
The optimal solution requires virus scanning at several
points in the network: at the gateway, at each mailstore,
and on the desktop. In addition, some enterprises elect to
deploy different virus-scanning strategies (e.g., signaturebased and distribution-based) to minimize the possibility
of an outbreak prior to a release of a new virus signature
for signature-based vendor solutions (so called zero-day
anti-virus defense).
Scanning for viruses at the gateway lessens the volume of
virus-laden messages that could affect end-user desktops
and the mailserver. Mailstore scanning on inter-user
traffic, either on the same server or multiple mailservers,
provides another tier to cleanse the environment from
potential threats. For the end user, scanning at the
desktop for malware using delivery channels outside the
control of the email environment is also critical.
Enterprises should look for an anti-spam engine that
receives both periodic and micro-updates to deal with
the real-time flow and patterns of spam on the Internet.
In addition, it should include flexible policy enforcement
to augment the functionality of the anti-spam engine.
This gives the administrator the ability to block, delete
and redirect specific messages based on patterns
detected in their subject and/or message body.
With the right combination of connection control, antispam and anti-virus solutions at the gateway, most
unwanted messages can be turned away before they are
committed to resource-intensive Exchange processing
and storage.

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Security, Policy Enforcement

and Compliance.
Another critical value-add to groupware security is
message content filtering and policy management.
These give the administrator additional control over
inbound/outbound and internal message flow, down to
the individual message, sender, or recipient, as well as such
criteria as users group, role, or security classification, etc.
Powerful policy management capabilities are required to
comply with increasingly stringent regulatory requirements
as well as corporate governance issues such as leakages of
confidential data and inappropriate messages violating HR
policies. Key policy requirements include:

Directory-enabled policy control for user- or

The optimal message processing environment should

include a flexible policy management system that is
able to execute policies created for global message
control and specific per-message content control. Some
policies need to be enforced at the gateway for inbound
and outbound messages (sometimes using dedicated
gateways for each flow), while other policies apply to
internal messages as well external.
The Defense in Depth strategy recognizes this need and
leverages policy engines at the gateway and a standalone
policy engine on the internal network. This also enables
deployment of separate AS/AV solutions in a cascading
fashionless granular, high performance engine at the
gateway to eliminate clearly bad messages, followed by
more discriminating and higher processing cost engine on
the internal network handling fewer messages.

group-specific policiese.g., appropriate use

policies for customer service

Scanning for inadvertent or malicious disclosure of

non-public information (financial reporting, trade
secrets, customer data, proprietary code, etc.)

Selective encryption for regulatory compliance

e.g., encryption of protected health information
to comply with HIPAA

Selective quarantine for virus and spam

protection or supervisory review

Selective archiving for regulatory compliancee.g.,

broker messages in financial services institutions;
messages with SSNs or account numbers

Message modifications based on policies (header,

envelope and body)

Attachment stripping based on content, size, type

or virus status

Add/Delete of recipients (To, CC, BCC)

Addition of disclaimers to outgoing messages
Cascading policies or applying policy based on

Role-based, End-user Controls.

Connection control, anti-spam and anti-virus engines,
and policy management cant deflect all bad mail.
Regardless of the quantity, once unwanted mail reaches
the groupware server, it impacts system efficiency and
user productivity. Thats why role-based, individual
user controlssuch as per-user allow, block-lists and
quarantine accessare another essential component for
securing and optimizing groupware environments.
By implementing user controls, administrators gain the
ability to offload user support for basic functions, (e.g.,
managing spam filtering beyond the default threshold;
removing false positive spam from quarantine) while
maintaining appropriate control over security. This self-help
capability has the additional benefit of user satisfaction, as
end users can quickly and easily resolve issues.

prior policy results

Applying different policies to different recipients

for the same message (envelope splitting)

Sendmail, Inc.

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Directory-driven Email Security.

Directory-driven email security is a key element of the
Defense in Depth strategy. Utilized throughout the
entire email network, directory information is accessed
to optimize capabilities such as: connection control, email
policy, applying AS/AV and content filtering and message
routing. For example: taking user information from an
Active Directory source and mapping the mailserver
information stored there to industry-standard DNS names
for email delivery.
By utilizing a high performance LDAP messaging-only
directory server, enterprises can leverage up-to-date
directory data to optimize the key component parts of
the messaging infrastructure. The result is a more secure
network and less processing/storage/disk space used
due to fewer unwanted messages and more precise
routing between mailstores. Key requirements for using
directories as part of email security include:

A centralized, secure messaging-only directory

optimized for message processing

Automated synchronization capability from multiple

LDAP and non-LDAP data sources
A secure, read-only, DMZ directory replica that
is updated from the centralized directory and
protected from DMZ attacks

Unified Management and Reporting

of the Entire System.
Enterprises that deploy multiple point products in
order to secure email and groupware networks end
up with multiple islands of administration to manage
these environments. The result is complex security
management in an environment that is error-prone
and potentially susceptible to failure.

Sendmail, Inc.

The optimal solution provides administrators with

centralized control over point products and key security
components. Functionality should include overseeing mail
queues, aggregating traffic reports, automating email traffic
alert notifications, monitoring specific health attributes and
providing statistical reports for each SMTP router.

View the Entire Message Stream.

Unified management and reporting gives administrators
a view into all aspects of message flow, filtering and policy
application. This view helps administrators anticipate
potential issues, and provides complete forensics to
quickly track down the root source of problems. It also
provides an audit trail for meeting regulatory and/or
corporate requirements.

Failover Protection to Enhance

the Reliability of Groupware.
Many groupware systems, such as Microsoft Exchange
and Lotus Notes, are preconfigured to bounce mail if they
do not receive an immediate confirmation after recipient
mailserver failures. Rather than queue such messages on
the groupware email server and load it with delivery retries, the optimal solution must possess the capability to
queue and store messages in a separate MTA for delivery
until the mail environment becomes available or the
redundant environment is ready for routing.
This architecture can include optional onsite and offsite
failover MTA servers. In case of an internal or external failure,
an alternate MTA can accept and queue email for delivery
so that the system does not lose any messages. When the
regular email system resumes operation, recipients receive
mail from the queue. With the right solution in place, during
an outage, customers, business partners and even internal
users are unlikely to ever see a message bounce.

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Integration with Multiple

Groupware Applications.
Few large enterprises feature a single server or
homogenous groupware environment. Corporate
mergers, acquisitions and restructurings have complicated
groupware, messaging and directory infrastructures.
Disparate domains, products, and geographic distribution
also present an administrative challenge.
The optimal email security solution features a single,
centralized, email-specific messaging directory, and
automatically consolidates relevant (user, mailstore
routing, group) information from multiple groupware
applications, non-standard formats and email systems to
create a more efficient and secure network. A centralized,
automated messaging directory perfects routing, and
informs policy, because it leverages a single, consistent,
instance of corporate information.

Sendmail: The Complete

Architecture for Securing and
Optimizing Groupware Networks.

Sendmail solutions not only prevent unwanted mail

from entering the groupware networkthey optimize
the entire environment for security, reliability and
performance each step of the way with Defense in Depth.

Fewer Messages Equals Fewer Exchange Servers.

In addition to preventing virus-related downtime, blocking
attacks and unwanted mail at the gateway enables
companies to save money on hardware and storage. With
increasing email volumes and over-taxed groupware
servers, such as Microsoft Exchange, companies typically
need to purchase additional servers to maintain system
performance while keeping pace with incoming messages.
Sendmail customers typically see a 50% reduction in
unwanted messages at the gateway. A company that
drops 50% of unwanted messages prior to spam and virus
scanning, followed by a further elimination or quarantine
of suspected spam is primed to dramatically reduce the
email reaching its Exchange (groupware) servers, sometimes
by 75-80%, resulting in a parallel reduction in the number
of servers or increase in the number of users that can be
supported by each server. Often this means savings in the
range of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. The
larger the enterprise, the greater the savings will be.

Over half of the Fortune 100, including seven of the

top ten, relies on Sendmail to design and implement
email security solutions based on the Defense in Depth
strategy. This expertise is why the largest corporate
email networks trust Sendmail to support hundreds of
thousands of their end users.

Sendmail, Inc.

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With Sendmail, enterprise groupware environments gain:

Sendmail Sentrion: Protecting Groupware

Connection regulation and management

oReduces invalid/unwanted connections by
50 percent
oValidates address queries more efficiently
and accurately by leveraging directories
oEliminates unnecessary queuing and generation
of bounce messages

Dependable, accurate, and optimized routing

oEnhances regulation of mailflow and
mailserver traffic
oImproves routing accuracy through directory
integration
oProvides dependable network redundancy
and failover protection
oProvides selective recipient/channel encryption

Flexible approaches to protect against spam

and viruses

oCaptures 99 percent of spam and virus traffic

with multiple AS & AV engines
oFilters and scans at the mailstore and gateway levels
oExtends AS/AV filtering with additional cascading
policies
oProvides end-user quarantine facility and personal
delivery filters

Policy enforcement for corporate and regulatory

compliance

oEstablishes role-based policy with directory

integration
oEnables policies to support specific regulatory
requirements (SOX, HIPAA, GLBA, Reg FD,
SEC Rule 17a-4)
oComprehensive policies for inbound, outbound
and internal mail
oIntegrates with third-party content encryption
solutions

Internet

100,000 inbound messages

representing 10,000 connections
Sendmail Sentrion email gateway
security appliance eliminates half
of all messages and connections.
High
Speed
Queries

Sentrion AS/AV filters

and policy send
35,000 to quarantine

Receiving 15,000 messages

Periodic Directory
Synchronization

Exchange SMTP
BridgeHead 1

Active Directory
Environment

Quarantine

Exchange User
Mailbox Stores

Delivery of
valid email
to user mailbox
Exchange SMTP
BridgeHead 2

The Sendmail Sentrion email gateway security appliance uses advanced

connection controls to reject up to 50% of unwanted mail, based on invalid
addresses and suspicious connection patterns. Powerful spam and virus
scanning provide additional protection, virtually eliminating all unwanted
messages.

Sendmail provides a complete solution for securing

Exchange or any other groupware network. It supports all
Internet-based mail protocols, including SMTP, POP and
IMAP. It interacts with directories such as Microsoft Active
Directory, Lotus Domino, Novell eDirectory, Netscape iPlanet/
Sun One/Fedora Directory Server, Open LDAP, and any other
standards-compliant LDAP v3 directory server. In addition,
Sendmail runs on most of the major operating platforms.

Appliance or Software to Meet

Any Enterprise Requirement.
Sendmail Sentrion is an email gateway security
appliance that packages Sendmails award-winning
software into an easy-to-deploy, integrated, and secure
solution to defend the perimeter of the email network.

Sendmail, Inc.

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BOUNDARY CONTROL

CONTENT & POLICY CONTROL

Firewall

EMAIL CLIENT(S)

Firewall
GATEWAY PROTECTION
Sendmail Mailstream Manager
and Sentrion Appliance

INTERNET

USERS

Outlook
Notes
Sendmail

INTERNAL POLICY &

MAIL MANAGEMENT
Sendmail Mailstream Manager

Anti-Virus

Anti-Spam

Anti-Virus

CONNECTION
CONTROL
Sendmail
Flow Control

ROUTING
Sendmail
Switch (MTA)

ROUTING
Sendmail
Switch (MTA)

MESSAGE STORE(S)
Exchange
Domino
Novell
Sendmail

Webmail
Sendmail
Wireless

CORPORATE DATA SOURCES

DIRECTORIES:
Active Directory, Domino,
OpenLDAP, SunOne, Novell

Quarantining

Address
Validation

SENDMAIL DIRECTORY SERVICES

DirSync

Encryption
Server

DMZ

Sendmail
Messaging
Directory Replicas

Sendmail
Messaging
Directory Master

RELATIONAL DATABASE(S):
Oracle, MySQL,
MS-SQL Server

FLAT FILES

The Sendmail email security architecture enables Defense in Depth. This multi-layered approach includes gateway components deployed to defend the
perimeter of the email network, and additional policy, directory, and quarantine components within the secured portion of the network. With Defense in
Depth, the message processing network provides optimal security and infrastructure capabilities for each security zone.

As the highest performing email gateway appliance,

Sentrion provides a robust and scalable foundation
for Defense in Depth. Sentrion features centralized
management of comprehensive security policies by
combining functionality of three proven Sendmail
software components with a unified management and
monitoring interface:

Powerful connection control delivered by Sendmail

Flow Control

High performance and secure routing delivered by

the Sendmail MTA
Comprehensive policy enforcement delivered by
Sendmail Mailstream Manager, with multiple antispam and anti-virus options

As with all Sendmail products, Sentrion leverages

directory-driven email security, providing comprehensive
integration with Active Directory and other corporate
directories. With all of this functionality and performance
packed into a hardened system, the Sentrion appliance is
designed to easily secure and optimize groupware networks
of any size. Defense in Depth starts with email gateway
defense; the Sentrion appliance fulfills this requirement.
Sendmail, Inc.

For enterprises whose perimeter defense requirements

extend beyond a gateway appliance, Sendmail offers
a complete array of enterprise email security software
solutions designed to secure the perimeter of the email
network. These products include:

Robust & Scalable Message Routing: Sendmail

Switch MTA
The Sendmail Switch mail transfer agent is the highperformance MTA designed to optimize and protect
the flow of email moving in/out of the enterprise. In
addition to regulating flow, Switch provides failover
protection. In the event of a network connection failure,
it will intelligently accept and queue messages until
the environment becomes available or the redundant
network path is ready.
Sendmail Switch integrates with Sendmail Directory
Services to add additional intelligence to routing and
policy enforcement.

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Connection Control: Sendmail Flow Control

Sendmail Flow Control regulates the flow of all inbound
and outbound connections at the SMTP level. With Flow
Controls powerful defense against DoS and DHA attacks,
enterprises typically experience a reduction in connections
of over 50 percent. The resulting benefits for groupware
environments are a dramatic decrease in mailstore traffic
(unwanted mail) and reduced directory queries.

Policy-based Gateway Security: Sendmail

Mailstream Manager
Sendmails award-winning Mailstream Manager features
a fully-integrated email policy management solution
that combines anti-spam, anti-virus, text and attachment
scanning with rich inbound and outbound policy
enforcement functionality and centralized management.
Mailstream Managers flexible directory query
mechanism infuses policy with the power of corporate
information.
Mailstream Manager works hand-in-hand with the
Switch MTA and Flow Control to deliver a resilient and
dependable security strategy for the gateway.
Beyond perimeter security provided by Sendmail Sentrion
or software solutions, enterprises can deploy an internal
routing MTA using Sendmail Switch that is designed to
optimize and protect the flow of messaging moving within
the enterprise. This will ensure that messages arrive at the
correct mailstore the first time, everytime.
An internal deployment of Mailstream Manager
provides a flexible integration of an additional layer of
AS/AV scanning with enforcement of corporate policies
and regulatory requirements on internal message flows. It
also enables integration of email archiving, recovery, and
e-discovery solutions.

Sendmail, Inc.

The resulting benefits are more complete spam and virus

protection, and granular control over internal message
routing and processing. To add extra intelligence to
these functions Mailstream Manager fully leverages
directory data.
In parallel with the MTA and policy manager, enterprises
deploy Sendmail Intelligent Quarantine, which provides
a powerful, policy-based, centralized facility for queuing,
reviewing, and taking action on quarantined messages.
Intelligent Quarantine is designed to safely quarantine
inbound messages from the network perimeter and
outbound messages. Deployed with a robust, scalable
mailstore, Intelligent Quarantine provides safe, reliable
access to quarantine queues within the safe confines of
the corporate network, away from the gateway.
Sendmail Directory Services works with all of these
products providing the most relevant information to
enhance message routing and policy enforcement and to
automatically synchronize multiple LDAP and non-LDAP
data sources.
Sendmail Directory Services (SDS) is the most widely
deployed commercial LDAP directory specifically
designed and tuned for the enterprise email
infrastructure. SDS centralizes users, alternate email
addresses, groups, administrative group information
and policy-related information into a secure, centrally
managed data repository and provides this information
to groupware servers across the enterprise to add
additional intelligence to gateway security, routing,
policy enforcement, and redundancy.
Sendmail also provides a scalable, standards-based
mailstore solution, Sendmail Mailcenter, which can
be deployed in parallel with groupware solutions, or
implemented when other groupware mailstores are
cost-prohibitive.

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WHITE PAPER
Leveraging Defense in Depth to Protect Your Groupware Platform.

A Partner You Can Trust.

With proven technology used across the Internet for the
past 20 years to deliver over half of all Internet email, and
through the experiences gained at over 4,500 enterprise
implementations, Sendmail has enabled the largest
enterprise networks to secure and optimize email for
hundreds of thousands of employees. This expertise

drives our continuing solution refinement and innovation,

as well as the best practices provided by our professional
services and technical support organizations.

Sendmail provides the industrys most comprehensive

knowledge base for designing, optimizing and protecting
any email and groupware network. To learn how
Sendmail can protect and optimize your Exchange or
groupware environment please contact us.

Notes:

Sendmail, Inc. 6425 Christie Ave., Emeryville, CA 94608 USA| Tel: +1 888 594 3150 or +1 510 594 5400 | Fax: +1 510 594 5429 | www.sendmail.com
2005 Sendmail, Inc. All rights reserved. Sendmail, the Sendmail logo, Sendmail Directory Services, Sendmail Flow Control, Sendmail Switch, Sendmail
Mailstream Manager, Sendmail Intelligent Quarantine, Sendmail Mailcenter and Sendmail Sentrion are trademarks of Sendmail, Inc. Other trademarks, service
marks and trade names belong to their respective companies..

Sendmail, Inc.

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