Secure Email
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A
digital certificate allows you to send secure emails to our Office, whether it
be a complaint or an enquiry, by encrypting your emails. By securing your email
communication with a digital certificate, you increase the security of all your
outgoing and incoming email communication. The OPC has taken this initiative to
allow users who wish to communicate with us in a secure manner to download a
free digital certificate from our website. OPC digital certificates can be used
to:
- Encrypt your outbound emails to our Office to prevent unauthorised access
during transmission;
- Sign your outgoing email so that the recipient knows the email came from
your email address.
Benefits
An OPC digital certificate offers the following benefits:
- Confidentiality - emails are transmitted between you and the OPC securely in
encrypted form;
- Authenticated users - The recipient of email can trust that the email has
come from the sender if the email is digitally signed (optional).
Risks & Disadvantages
- If you lose your digital certificate (eg: through computer malfunction) your
access to your encrypted email is also lost. This risk is offset by keeping a
backup of the certificate on a removable storage device in a secure location;
- Encryption uses more resources, hence is a bit slower than normal emails;
- Encrypting emails is relatively more complex than sending plain text emails
when initially setting up the secure mode.
Liability
The OPC takes no responsibility for any loss of data or email or any computer
configuration and support. We offer this facility to enable people who wish to
communicate with us over the internet by secure means.
Email software that can be used with these digital
certificates
- Microsoft Outlook
- Microsoft Outlook Express
There are other email clients which may be used. However, we have not been
able to test them. Users who wish to use other clients may contact relevant
vendors for support.
How can I get a digital certificate?
A simple registration process allows you to install the digital certificate
on your computer. The certificate will be valid for five years.
Warning to Microsoft Vista™ users: Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0 does not currently support this certificate. You may experience difficulties during the installation.
Supporting Information
- How to send and receive encrypted emails using Microsoft Outlook 2003 - PDF, Word
- How to export the digital certificate - PDF, Word
- How to import the digital certificate - PDF, Word
- How to remove the digital certificate - PDF, Word
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