Carthage system administrator at leading edge of new technology

When sent and received emails are combined, Carthage emails add up to several hundred thousand email messages per day, millions of messages per month, and hundreds of millions per year. Carthage system administrator Max McGrath is at the forefront of working to prevent fraudulent mail from getting through. Max recently presented his work at the WISCNET Future Technologies Conference in Madison. Max’s work positions Carthage on the leading edge of reducing email forging and fraud at colleges and universities.

Email forging is relatively easy to do and email fraud is a big business. When the technology behind email was invented in the 1970s, there was little thought given to preventing forging, phishing, and fraud. Many organizations use two technologies to help reduce fraud. The two technologies, called SPF and DKIM, are helpful in detecting and catching fraud after the fact, but they do not do a great job of preventing fraud before it occurs. A new technology called DMARC builds on these two technologies to actually help prevent email fraud. DMARC allows the system administrator to set authentication standards for sending and receiving email. Max is one of the first college and university system administrators in Wisconsin to begin implementing the DMARC standard.

Carthage uses Gmail and Campaign Monitor for email. These companies actively participate in DMARC. Some College offices use other systems that include email services that do not participate in DMARC. At some future date, all College systems will be required to use DMARC. Please contact Max if you are using software that has email “built in.”

Currently, Carthage is using DMARC in a monitoring phase in order to determine what authentication levels are required. In the future, Carthage will move to the quarantine phase. If you suspect that you have been the recipient of a fraudulent email, do no follow any directions or links found in it, contact the help desk at 262-551-5950.