21 Email Security Best Practices Every Professional Must Know

Email security isn’t something to be taken lightly. For many organizations, email is the most important communication channel. If someone gains access to your account, it could open the door to data breaches—and they aren’t cheap these days.

Most would-be hackers and competitors are opportunists looking for low-hanging fruit. Even routine, basic security practices will protect you from the vast majority of threats. Here are 21 email security best practices every professional must know.

How Do You Create and Manage Secure Email Passwords?

Short answer: Use strong, unique passwords for each account with a mix of characters, change them regularly, never share them, and enable two-factor authentication.

1. Use a Strong Email Password

With 2 million people using “123456” as a password, this topic is worth exploring. Most cybercriminals don’t brute-force their way into accounts—they guess passwords or use social engineering. A “strong” password is hard to guess.

Make your password stronger by using a mix of lower-case letters, upper-case letters, numbers, and special symbols. Make it longer—each character multiplies possible combinations. Avoid easy-to-guess combinations like your company name, birthday, or simple sequences like “1234.”

2. Use Different Passwords for Different Accounts

Once you create a strong password, you’ll be tempted to use it everywhere. Don’t. If a hacker gets your password for one account, they’ll try it with others connected to your name. Use unique passwords for each account so one breach doesn’t compromise everything.

3. Change Your Password Regularly

Change your passwords at least once a year. After data breaches, thieves sometimes sit on stolen data for weeks to years until attention dies down. Regular password changes prevent these time-delayed attacks and make your password harder to guess since it’s never the same for too long.

4. Never Give Out Your Password

No reputable email company will ever ask for your password directly, over email or phone. If someone claims to be from Gmail and asks for your password, it’s almost certainly a scam. Don’t even discuss your password with friends or write it on a sticky note. Keep it private at all times.

5. Enable Two-Factor Authentication

In Gmail, you can enable two-factor authentication (also called 2-step or multi-factor authentication). This prompts you for two pieces of identifying information—usually a password plus a temporary code sent to your phone. While slightly inconvenient, it only takes seconds and provides an extra barrier of protection if your password is compromised. (Here’s our guide on how to turn off 2-step verification if needed.)

How Do You Encrypt and Protect Email Content?

Short answer: Use Gmail’s Confidential mode for sensitive messages, set expiration dates, require SMS passcodes, and consider encryption add-ons like FlowCrypt or Virtru.

6. Use Gmail’s Confidential Mode

Gmail has a built-in “Confidential” mode for sending emails more securely. Open the Compose window, click the lock-and-clock icon in the bottom row. Once enabled, recipients cannot forward, copy, print, or download the message contents. This helps prevent confidential information from spreading beyond intended recipients.

You can set an expiration date so the message self-destructs, and require the email to be unlocked with a unique SMS passcode sent to your recipient’s mobile device—preventing the message from being seen by prying eyes.

7. Consider Encryption Add-ons

Gmail is friendly to third-party developers, and there are hundreds of Gmail apps, add-ons, and extensions to improve your email experience. Some focus specifically on security—for example, FlowCrypt or Virtru can secure your attachments and messages with end-to-end encryption.

How Should You Manage Your Email Accounts Securely?

Short answer: Keep personal and work accounts separate, log out when finished, avoid giving away your email address unnecessarily, and regularly review security settings.

8. Don’t Mix Personal and Professional Email Accounts

Avoid using your personal account for professional emails or vice versa. If you use your work email for personal communications, it opens the door to more security risks. If you exchange work-related information on a private account, it becomes vulnerable if that personal account is ever hacked. Keep accounts segmented.

9. Visualize Your Team’s Email Activity

Start by visualizing your email activity. How many emails do you send and receive daily? How many newsletters are you subscribed to? Understanding your email patterns helps identify security risks—like suspicious senders, potentially harmful attachments, or employees falling victim to phishing scams.

10. Avoid Giving Your Email Address Away

Resist giving your email address to every website that requests it. While most businesses only use it for newsletters, some sell your information to third parties or make it public, exposing you to more email threats. If you don’t have to give it out, don’t.

11. Log Out When Finished

When you’ve finished another productive day, log out of your email account. This is especially important on unfamiliar devices or networks, but should be adopted 100% of the time. It makes it harder for someone to access your email just by starting your device.

12. Periodically Review Security Settings

Every few months, review your security and privacy settings in Gmail. List secondary contact information Google can use to verify your identity, and check for unauthorized login attempts. Scroll to the bottom of Gmail and click “Details” in the bottom-right corner to see all account activity and monitor for suspicious behavior.

How Do You Recognize and Avoid Email Scams?

Short answer: Learn common scam types (phishing, Nigerian Prince), verify suspicious senders through other channels, investigate unusual URLs, and never provide personal information via email.

13. Be Aware of Email Schemes

Many scammers use email because it’s cheap and infinitely scalable. You can guard against most scams simply by knowing they exist.

Phishing is one of the most common schemes, where emails mimic trusted authorities (your bank, eBay) to trick you into revealing personal details. Also watch for Nigerian Prince scams, guaranteed loans, lottery winnings, disaster relief scams, and shady offers on items you’re buying or selling online.

14. Investigate Suspicious Messages

If a message seems even slightly suspicious, investigate it. Search online for the subject line or message contents—you’ll often find pages identifying it as a scam. You probably aren’t the first target. If the message appears to come from a trusted source, contact them through another channel to verify.

15. Investigate Suspicious URLs

Before clicking any link, especially from unfamiliar sources, investigate. Scammers may replace one letter in a domain to fool you—like paypal.net instead of paypal.com, or goggle.com instead of google.com. They may also use link shortening services to disguise malicious URLs. Most shortening services let you preview links before clicking (for example, adding a + symbol to bitly links).

16. Never Give Away Personal Information in Email

No reputable company will ask for personally identifying information over email. If anyone asks for your birthday, social security number, credit card number, or password, it’s almost certainly a scam. Contact the company directly using information you find online (not from the suspicious email) to verify the request.

17. Avoid Replying to Scammers

If you’ve identified a scammer, don’t reply—even to give them a piece of your mind. Responding verifies that your email address is valid, opening the door to more attacks. The response may not even reach the intended recipient anyway.

How Do Device and Network Choices Affect Email Security?

Short answer: Only access email on secure devices, avoid public Wi-Fi, and keep antivirus software installed on all devices you use for email.

18. Be Careful Which Devices You Use

Many companies now have bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policies, but this can be dangerous. If your personal device is infected with malware, logging into your professional email could expose you to hacking. Take security precautions with every device you use for email.

19. Be Careful Which Wi-Fi Networks You Use

Only access email when you’re confident in your network’s security. Publicly accessible, unsecured Wi-Fi is risky—anyone on the network could hypothetically monitor your actions and access personal information. Stick to trusted Wi-Fi networks.

20. Keep Antivirus Software Installed

Keep antivirus software installed on your machine. Most antivirus programs automatically scan email attachments before download and prevent access to malicious webpages. They can also remove malware that makes its way onto your computer. Norton is the biggest name, but AVG is a free option that does most of the same things. Some threats like Chromium virus may require specific steps to completely uninstall Chromium on Mac.

How Do You Handle Email Attachments Safely?

Short answer: Never open attachments from untrusted sources. Verify unexpected attachments by contacting the sender through another channel before opening.

21. Never Open Untrusted Attachments

Attachments are the most common way to spread malware. Opening an attachment downloads it to your computer, potentially including malicious scripts or programs. Many attempts use strange or zipped file types, but some arrive disguised as conventional files like .jpg or .pdf.

Only open attachments that match your expectations from users you trust. If you’re ever in doubt, call the sender and ask them to verify the contents before opening.