Email remains one of the most important security surfaces in any organization. It is where phishing attacks land, where sensitive business data accumulates, and where attackers often begin or expand an account takeover. But the best practices for email security have changed. It is no longer enough to focus only on blocking bad messages before delivery. Modern organizations need protection that covers the entire cloud workspace, including inboxes, identities, and the sensitive data already sitting in email archives. Material Security’s public positioning reflects that shift, emphasizing deep visibility and response inside Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 rather than relying only on perimeter-era controls.
Start with layered protection, not a single control
The best email security programs are layered. That means using multiple controls that work together rather than assuming one filter or one workflow will stop every attack.
A strong baseline starts with phishing and malware detection. Traditional filters and secure email gateways can still help catch spam, malicious attachments, suspicious links, and some impersonation attempts before they reach users. But modern attacks often involve social engineering, internal compromise, or vendor impersonation that may not contain obvious malicious payloads. That is one reason Material positions modern email security as going beyond gateway-style filtering.
Protect against account takeover, not just bad messages
Email security best practices should always assume that some attacks will get through. That is why identity protection matters as much as message inspection.
Organizations should strengthen MFA, monitor for risky account behavior, review OAuth and third-party app access, and reduce the amount of sensitive content that becomes instantly accessible after a compromised login. Google has long recommended steps such as reviewing OAuth access, enforcing stronger authentication, and publishing DMARC to help prevent phishing and abuse. Material’s account takeover messaging takes that one step further by focusing on limiting the blast radius even after compromise.
Treat the inbox like a sensitive data repository
One of the most overlooked email security best practices is protecting the data already stored in mailboxes. In most organizations, inboxes hold years of contracts, credentials, financial records, customer details, and regulated information. That makes the email archive a high-value target during an account takeover. Material’s public use-case pages explicitly frame mailbox data as a major security and governance problem, especially when defenders lack visibility into what is sitting inside old messages and attachments.
Build post-delivery response into the program
A modern email security program should not end at delivery. Teams need ways to investigate suspicious messages after they arrive, respond quickly to user reports, and remediate similar threats across the organization.
Material’s public approach to user-reported phishing highlights why this matters: one user report can be used to classify similar emails, reduce duplicate analyst work, and apply broad remediation faster. That is a best practice because it turns employees into a meaningful detection layer instead of leaving reported messages trapped in a slow, manual queue.
Keep email security aligned with the way cloud work actually happens
The biggest email security mistake today is treating cloud email like an old on-prem mail server. Modern work happens across email, calendar, drive, identity systems, and third-party apps. Security controls should reflect that reality.
The best practice is simple: combine strong inbound detection with post-delivery visibility, account takeover resilience, sensitive data protection, and fast response workflows. That is how organizations move from “email filtering” to actual email security.
Put Email Security Best Practices Into Practice With Material Security
Strong email security requires more than blocking suspicious messages. Teams also need better visibility into risky behavior, faster response to phishing that reaches users, and protection for sensitive data already sitting in inboxes. Material Security is built for that broader approach: modernizing email security inside Google Workspace and Microsoft 365, automating user-reported phishing response, improving visibility across the cloud workspace, and helping protect sensitive mailbox data.
If your team is working to strengthen email security best practices in a modern cloud environment, Material Security can help you operationalize that strategy with deeper detection and response, sensitive-data protection, and continuous insight into risky changes across your workspace. Request a demo of Material Security to see how it can support your email security program.
