Every adult has probably dealt with emails at some point in his or her life and communicating by emails has become a normal way for life in many developed and developing countries. However, there are certain standards and guidelines associated with emails including the issue of email archiving. The following are 4 things to know about email archiving.
1. What is email archiving? Archiving relates to preservation. Hence, with respect to emails, email archiving refers to the preservation of emails and all the data such as meta-data associated with the emails. This may also include attachments, flags and priority settings. The emails that could be archived include emails that are entering an inbox and emails leaving the mailbox. Typically, email archiving is an automated process which could be configured when the email account or system is initially set up.
2. What is the purpose of email archiving? In one simple word: availability! By archiving emails, owners and administrators could have emails available when required. Sometimes, the actual need to retain emails may not be immediately apparent. However, by keeping emails in an archiving system, these emails are then easily made available if the need should arise. Archived emails may be used as documentation, reminders, for legal proceedings, for knowledge transfer applications and other related situations.
3. What are the benefits of email archiving? The benefits of email archiving can be derived from the purpose of archiving. Having information readily available can be a good thing and may serve to be quite useful in certain circumstances. If emails have been accidentally removed or deleted, an archiving system could easily re-insert such emails into an inbox. In addition, emails could contain valuable information that could protect an organization or be closely related to its brand. Thus, having such information stored in a safe place could provide immense value. Archiving emails could also provide the ability to free up active space in inboxes by automatically removing older emails and placing such emails in the archive. This could free up the email system and make email retrieval faster across the organization.
4. What are the features of email archiving? Depending on the type of email archiving system configured in an organization, there are different features that may or may not be included. One feature of such systems is the way the emails are retrieved. This could either be direct retrieval from inboxes where emails sit in a ‘resting’ state or emails may be archived when being moved, removed or deleted from the system.
There could be different ways to maintain an email archive. Sometimes, these storage systems could exist in the cloud or online. Physical storage devices may also be used. There are also email archiving compliance guidelines which include rules and guidelines governing the storage, archiving and retrieval of emails. Such regulatory compliance helps business protect their intellectual property and it also ensures that corporate data is secure and available if an associated need ever arises.
In addition, there could be the need to set and adhere to certain email retention and purging policies. For more information, please visit:
email archiving compliance
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