What tools and methods exist to monitor unauthorized brand use in email marketing?
Summary
What email marketers say11Marketer opinions
Email marketer from Proofpoint shares that their Email Fraud Defense solution identifies and blocks fraudulent emails that impersonate your brand. It uses machine learning to detect anomalies and prevent phishing attacks.
Email marketer from Reddit suggests setting up Google Alerts for your brand name, common misspellings, and variations. This can help you quickly identify websites or social media posts that are using your brand without permission, which might indicate unauthorized email campaigns.
Email marketer from Twitter shares that you monitor social media for mentions of your brand and any associated keywords to identify potential brand abuse in email campaigns.
Marketer from Email Geeks suggests Lashback, widely used in the affiliate world, to ensure mailers use proper creatives and adhere to legal/privacy policies when sending mail on behalf of brands.
Email marketer from ZeroFox explains that their platform monitors social media, dark web forums, and other online channels for brand mentions and potential threats. This can help detect unauthorized email campaigns using your brand without your permission.
Email marketer from Quora responds that you implement SPF, DKIM, and DMARC to prevent email spoofing. They also suggest monitoring DMARC reports to identify unauthorized email sources and take action to block them.
Email marketer from BrandVerity Blog explains that brand monitoring tools can detect unauthorized use of your brand in email marketing by scanning for your brand name, logo, and other trademarks in email content and subject lines. They also monitor for phishing attacks and spoofing attempts.
Email marketer from Bolster shares that they provide AI-powered brand protection that identifies and removes fraudulent websites and content that impersonate your brand. This includes monitoring for phishing emails and fake websites that use your brand assets.
Email marketer from Marketing Over Coffee Forum mentions using a combination of manual searches and automated tools. They suggest regularly searching for your brand name on Google, social media, and email blacklists. They also recommend using a brand monitoring service to automate the process.
Marketer from Email Geeks suggests Red Sift, focusing on malicious lookalike domains hosting phishing websites rather than rogue affiliates.
Marketer from Email Geeks shares that companies like Mark Monitor and RiskIQ monitor trademark infringement using newly registered domain names, data feeds, and data from link shorteners, offering a better approach than focusing solely on email.
What the experts say4Expert opinions
Expert from Email Geeks shares that he had plans to implement a brand monitoring system but didn't find any commercial services when he looked a couple of years ago.
Expert from Spam Resource explains that implementing DMARC policies is essential for brand protection, allowing domain owners to specify how receiving mail servers should handle unauthenticated email appearing to come from their domains.
Expert from Word to the Wise shares a story about dealing with brand impersonation via email and recommends using feedback loops, complaint management, and DMARC to mitigate such issues.
Expert from Email Geeks explains that a crowdsourced approach can help, suggesting well-managed abuse and support aliases to discover impersonations.
What the documentation says5Technical articles
Documentation from Red Sift shares that OnDMARC helps protect against domain impersonation and phishing attacks, which are forms of unauthorized brand use in email. It uses DMARC to authenticate email sources and prevent fraudulent emails from reaching recipients.
Documentation from Microsoft explains that Microsoft Defender for Office 365 offers anti-phishing protection by detecting and blocking email attacks that impersonate your brand. It uses machine learning to identify suspicious emails and prevent them from reaching users.
Documentation from Google explains that Google Safe Browsing helps protect users from phishing and malware websites. By monitoring the web for malicious content, it can help detect sites that are impersonating your brand and sending fraudulent emails.
Documentation from DMARC.org details how DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance) helps protect your brand by preventing email spoofing. It allows you to specify how email providers should handle messages that fail authentication checks.
Documentation from Mimecast highlights that their Brand Exploit Protect service identifies and mitigates threats stemming from the abuse of your brand online, including unauthorized email campaigns and domain spoofing.