Anyone who uses email is vulnerable to Phishing, Spear Phishing, Malware, Impersonation Email, Unsafe Links and Attachments, and more. Microsoft has a product called Advanced Threat Protection ATP to protect your email and PC’s from these threats.

Advanced Threat Protection ATP Capabilities:

ATP Safe Attachments

When ATP Safe Attachments is enabled and your attachment policy is set, ATP checks attachments on all of your emails. If an attachment is malicious, it takes appropriate action. This prevents you or others at your firm from clicking on attachments within your email that are malicious and can cause malware or ransomware on your PC.

ATP Safe Links

ATP Safe Links checks links to URL’s within your emails and documents.  You will be able to open safe URL links, but malicious links are blocked. This prevents you and others at your firm from clicking on a link within an email that is malicious and can cause malware or ransomware on your PC.

ATP Anti-Phishing

Phishing is a fraudulent email, trying to seem like it is coming from a legitimate organization. The email is designed to attempt to collect your private information; such as, your login and password, your credit card information, and more. ATP Anti-Phishing checks incoming email messages and rejects any that have properties of phishing emails.  This protects you from emails that you may think are legitimate, but are malicious and trying to collect your personal information.

ATP for SharePoint & OneDrive

OneDrive is used in Office 365 for an individual to store and synchronize their folders and files in the Cloud. SharePoint is used for more than one person to share folders and files in the Cloud. ATP for SharePoint and OneDrive detects and blocks malicious files from being stored in document libraries.

ATP Real-Time Reports

The Office365 Security Center includes real-time reports to identify attacks and potential suspicious activity. When identifying these issues, recommendations are made with links to view the data and take action. This is helpful to security or network administrators.

ATP Attack Simulator

Authorized users are able to simulate an attack against you and your PC users. Again, this is a simulated attack that you initiate to learn how to educate your users regarding spear-phishing attack, brute force attack, or a password-spray attack.

There are a few other additional capabilities of Advanced Threat Protection ATP; Threat Trackers and Explorer. Microsoft plans to continue to add capabilities as cyber security threats and attacks change.

A cloud-based email filtering system, Microsoft Office 365 Advanced Threat Protection (ATP), can be used with on-premise Exchange Email or your Exchange Online Email. Office 365 Enterprise E5 and Microsoft 365 Business are included with Advanced Threat Protection. Other plans; such as, Exchange Online Plan 1, Exchange Online Plan 2, Office 365 Business Essentials, Office 365 Business Premium, Office 365 Enterprise E1, and Office 365 Enterprise E3 can add Advanced Threat Protection. Advanced Threat Protection Plan 1 is $2/Month/Account (Plan 2 is $5/Month/Account).  Check and see what Office 365 subscription you have to add this beneficial add-on; Advanced Threat Protection.

Alicia A. Slade, MS, MBA, is the President of Plummer Slade, Inc., a computer networking and IT solutions firm located in downtown Pittsburgh.  Plummer Slade provides computer networking, MSP services, and software application solutions to hundreds of law firms in Pittsburgh and the surrounding area.  Plummer Slade is exclusively endorsed for IT Solutions by the Allegheny County Bar Association (ACBA).  Alicia has been a Technical Consultant for over 30 years and can be reached at 412-261-5600 x202 or slade@plummerslade.com.