Due to the huge level of spam we're facing each and every day, but also due to the large number of worms and viruses which can be transmitted through emails, the popularity of this means of communication has decreased, and now people are looking for a safer alternative to what used to be the fastest method of sending online messages.

Over 500 specialists representing 37 major providers of email services have participated to an event organized in New York with the purpose of rehabilitating the reputation of electronic mail, but also of establishing some criteria for attaining a maximum level of security for the sent messages, as well as guaranteeing the sender's identity.

Amongst those present were representatives of Microsoft and Yahoo, but also Esther Dyson, a very important name in the history of the Internet and representatives of the Direct Marketing Association.

The main subjects on the agenda have been the phishing-type attacks and their latest variants, as well as the huge level of spam that is responsible for the frequent bottlenecks occurring in dedicated servers, thus suffocating the computer networks.

Another important subject has been the theft of identity, and it's becoming increasingly obvious that the only solution for this problem is the implementation of an authenticating system, and another measure that could prove to be efficient would be a service for classifying the message senders. Some of the proposed solutions were either open source technologies, as the SPF (Sender Policy Framework), Microsoft's SIDF (Sender ID Framework) and DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail).

By establishing several "rankings" for the email senders, the email providers are trying to simplify and impose a higher level of security to the process of sending emails, and by adding sender ID, it his hoped that the basis of future secure emails will be established.