May 3, 2007

FEATURE EDITORIAL

Spam Volumes Continue to Soar in 2007

IDC, a provider of market intelligence, advisory services, and events for the information technology, telecommunications, and consumer technology markets, predicts that nearly 97 billion emails, over which 40 billion will be spam messages, will be sent daily worldwide in 2007. According to the IDC study published last month, this is the first year that spam email volumes are expected to exceed person-to-person email volumes sent worldwide. The study further states that the status of email as the leading mission-critical electronic communication method may be challenged due to the spam levels. Also contributing is the increased frequency of email being replaced by text messaging and Voice over IP (VoIP) calling, especially among younger consumers and workers.

"Spam volumes are growing faster than expected due to the success of image-based spam in bypassing anti-spam filters and of email sender identity spoofing getting higher response rates," says Mark Levitt, program vice president for IDC's Collaborative Computing and Enterprise Workplace research. "Instant messaging, joined by free and low-cost VoIP calling, will result in slower email growth, especially among teens and young adults." Those born between the late 1970s and the late 1990s, ‘Millenials' or ‘Generation Y' are the biggest generation since the baby boomers, and the fastest-growing segment of the workforce and consumer base. At 76 million strong, they are the first generation to grow up immersed in a digital and Internet driven world where cell phones, text messaging, TiVO and social networking are part of the fabric of how they live.

In its report, IDC says that email solution providers and their customers need to respond to these continued threats to email by doing the following:

• Recognize that email will be only one of several core elements of the emerging unified communications vision that solution providers will offer customers.
• Deploy multiple layers of commercial anti-spam software, appliances, and services that are regularly updated to increase effectiveness over time.
• Provide equal access to email from desktop and wireless access devices with Ajax and push email.

IDC's study, Worldwide Email Usage 2007-2011 Forecast: Resurgence of Spam Takes Its Toll (IDC #206038) examines how email is and will be used for business and personal purposes. In this eighth study on email usage, insights on how email usage is changing based on a 10+ year perspective (2000-2011) are provided, including trends and analysis on topics ranging from email boxes, users, primary access methods, free Webmail, size of business email volumes, and volumes of different types of email, including person-to-person emails, spam, and email alerts and notifications. The study focuses on overall email usage trends - not individual email companies, products, or services. Those interested can purchase a copy by emailing sales@idc.com.

Rich Clients: The Next Wave of Email Clients

Here's another study to be aware of. The Radicati Group, Inc., recently published its study Email Client Market, 2007-2011, which offers an in-depth analysis of the worldwide market for Email Clients. The study provides market trends, vendor installed base and revenue market share, four-year forecasts, breakout by version and region, technology trends, and an analysis of key players in the Email Client market.

The study shows that the market for Email Clients is primarily driven by the need for messaging and collaboration among users, as well as the global increase of Internet availability. Vendor and service providers are increasingly developing rich Email Clients to meet market needs and complement worldwide Internet growth. Rich clients provide users with elaborate messaging and collaboration features, as well as dynamic interfaces and web experience.

In addition, the study discusses upcoming releases of new Email Clients from leading vendors and service providers. The study also explains the new features of Microsoft Outlook 2007 and IBM Lotus Notes 8, and has a breakdown of MS Outlook and Lotus Notes by version. The study is available for purchase and can be ordered via the company's website.

MESSAGING NEWS CASE STUDY BRIEF:

The City of Chula Vista and Mimosa Systems

Mimosa Systems, a provider of Live Content Archiving solutions, recently announced that the City of Chula Vista, Calif. has deployed the next-generation Mimosa NearPoint for Microsoft Exchange Server to assure the retention, protection and recovery of its vital email data.

The City of Chula Vista, with a population approaching 225,000, is San Diego County's second largest city. The majority of the city's business applications require email and as such Microsoft Exchange has become a vital part of Chula Vista's communications infrastructure. With an increasing volume of email, Chula Vista city employees and elected officials were experiencing significant email performance degradation as users frequently sent large documents and PowerPoint presentation files. And, even though the city's IT organization had implemented a three month email retention policy to conserve server storage resources, users commonly saved all their historical emails in local PST files which started to experience corruption and monopolized costly desktop storage space.

"We have some users that simply don't delete any emails," said Pat Garcia, MIS administrator at the City of Chula Vista. "Large mailboxes cause major operational problems. After evaluating a number of solutions, we selected Mimosa NearPoint for its comprehensive functionality and powerful architecture that places no load on the production Exchange system. Now, with Mimosa NearPoint, users with virtual mailboxes of 1.5GB just take up 115MB on our Exchange servers. Moreover, all of our users have been impressed with the overall increase in our Exchange server performance."

We welcome your ideas and your news for Messaging Newswire’s News & Trends in Email Security. Let us know what you think by sending your comments to editorial@messagingnews.com. Written or compiled by Stephanie Jordan. All trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

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