Features
Administration
Uniquely designed for easy deployment and easy administration, Kerio MailServer provides comprehensive features and integrated tools.
Specially designed for networks with little or no IT staff, Kerio MailServer is easy to install and easy to administer. It is a robust solution with comprehensive features to provide complete email and collaboration package.
Easy deployment
Highly acclaimed for its ease of deployment, administrators can download, install and configure Kerio MailServer in minutes. Kerio MailServer comes with a wizard for setting up basic features such as the administrative account, the primary domain, and the location of the store directory.
Kerio's Windows applications are packaged with MSI installers, making deployment faster and easier through Active Directory or third party software deployment tools.
Configuration tools can be downloaded from Kerio WebMail allow users to setup Microsoft Outlook and Apple iCal without the assistance from IT. Users can setup Outlook with just a click and user's password. A wizard walks the user through the Apple iCal setup.
Self-contained services
Installation does not require a server-based operating system or a directory server. All services within Kerio MailServer are self contained, meaning it has no dependencies on other services which may be pre-installed with the operating system. (SMTP, POP, IMAP, LDAP, and HTTP)
Additional tools and functionalities that come with the installation are Kerio Mobility, anti-spam, anti-virus, mailing lists, archiving and backup. Integrated into the product and price, schools and businesses can save money in administration costs and from having to purchase the components separately.
Migration tools
To help lighten the burden of deployment, Kerio provides complementary migration tools to make migrations simple and smooth. Read more...
Directory service integration and user management
Kerio MailServer allows administrators to manage users in four different ways.
- Microsoft Active Directory (Watch video)
- Apple Open Directory (Watch video)
- PAM (Pluggable Authentication Module) on Linux
- Kerio MailServer's own internal user database
The integration with a directory service can help administrators manage user accounts in one location. Directory service integration is optional, which can be ideal for smaller organizations that don't need to setup a directory server.
Kerio MailServer can also allow simultaneous use of the internal database and a directory server to authenticate users. This allows administrators to easily manage temporary accounts without having to use Active Directory licenses.
All-inclusive administration console
In one interface, administrators can use Kerio Administration Console to configure all the settings of Kerio MailServer, including Kerio Mobility, anti-spam, anti-virus, mailing lists, archiving and backup.
Secure options
Several authentication options such as Cram-MD5, Kerberos authentication with directory servers, pluggable authentication modules (PAM) on the Linux version, are available to provide easy management and secure authentication. Policies can be enabled to enforce all connections to be secure.
Kerio MailServer provides a simple process to import root or intermediate SSL certificates as well as a wizard to create a self-signed certificate.
Multi-domain administration
Multiple domains can be created and managed with its own set of users, groups, email addresses, and mailing lists.
Remote administration
Kerio Administration Console for Kerio MailServer is a separate application, which can be installed on any supported operating system for remote administration. Remote connections to the server are encrypted.
Kerio Web Administration
Kerio Web Administration is a web-based interface that allows non-technical users to manage user accounts, email aliases, groups, mailing lists, and resources such as a conference room and projector from a web browser. Unlike the full-featured Kerio Administration Console, Kerio Web Administration cannot modify any other settings, and users can only change or view the settings of their own domain.
Mobile email
Kerio MailServer provides push email and wireless groupware data synchronization for the most popular smartphones and smartphone operating systems, including Windows Mobile, Symbian, Palm, BlackBerry and Apple iPhone.
Antivirus protection
Dual Anti-virus protection
With two different anti-virus engines running simultaneously, Kerio MailServer provides double the protection against viruses. While one anti-virus vendor may be late with a virus signature, a chance that both will fail to catch a virus is significantly lower.
Kerio MailServer offers a choice of using the built-in McAfee Anti-Virus, or using one of supplied anti-virus plug-ins, or using a combination of McAfee Anti-Virus and one of the anti-virus plug-ins.
Kerio MailServer with anti-virus plug-ins
Kerio MailServer supports a number of top anti-virus products using plug-ins developed with help from the anti-virus software vendors.
Third-party anti-virus must be installed on the same computer as Kerio MailServer.
Anti-spam protection
A combination of content-based SpamAssassin and sender-based anti-spam tools in Kerio MailServer significantly reduces the amount of unwanted email, helping to limit the legal hassles and security risks associated with spam.
Anti Spam Features
1. Directory Harvest Attack protection
Directory Harvest Attacks abuse the design of the SMTP protocol. When one mail server attempts to deliver a message to another mail server, it first inquires whether the recipient address exists on the target mail server. If it exists, the target mail server sends a confirmation; if not, the server responds with negative answer. Spammers take advantage of this communication by submitting multiple requests with different combinations of first and last names. By harvesting valid responses, spammers get very precise list of valid email addresses suitable for future spamming.
To fight directory harvest attacks, Kerio MailServer tracks the number of failed recipients during a conversation with the sending mail server. If a predefined threshold is met, the offending mail server will be blocked for a period of one hour.
2. Spam Repellent
Spam Repellent helps fight off spam zombies and viruses by delaying replies during the SMTP handshake.
Since spam mailers and viruses are very impatient when it comes to SMTP communication, they don't wait if the replies from a target mail server are not timely, and simply move on to try another target. By injecting an artificial time delay of a couple of seconds into the SMTP handshake, Kerio MailServer may filter up to 60-70 percent of spam and viruses without ever receiving the messages for analysis.
3. SpamAssassin
SpamAssassin is a powerful anti-spam engine integrated into Kerio MailServer that identifies junk email. Combining several technologies, SpamAssassin ensures that bulk spam email is properly captured and legitimate email is reliably delivered.
Heuristic engine
Using the heuristic engine in SpamAssassin, each email message is analyzed against multiple anti-spam rules and gives it a numerical rating based on which rules were matched. If the message rating exceeds the spam threshold, the message is marked as spam and then filtered according to the user's wishes.
Bayesian filter
To further increase the success rate and tailor the spam filter to the individual needs of every company, Kerio MailServer allows Outlook and WebMail users to easily train the Bayesian filter in SpamAssassin for every email message that is miscategorized. The Bayesian filter can also be trained by dragging and dropping email in or out of Kerio's Junk E-mail folder in Apple Mail or any other IMAP email client. SpamAssassin then compares incoming messages to spam messages reported by other users, and sees how similar they are to those reported messages.
Underlying technology
SpamAssassin is an anti-spam technology from the open-source Apache SpamAssassin Project.(www.spamassassin.org).
4. Dual filtering policies
Dual filtering policies give administrators the ability to tag messages with low spam score as spam and forward them to user's Junk Email Folders, whereas messages with really high spam score can be automatically discarded without ever reaching user's mailbox. Discarding emails with high spam scoring can help save hard drive space and reduce the amount of emails that endusers need to audit.
5. SURBL blocking
Similar to RBLs, SURBL (Spam URI Realtime Block Lists) will block messages that contains URIs (usually Web sites) in the message body that links to known spam hosts.
6. Real time blacklist support
Checks sender's IP address for each incoming SMTP connection. If the IP address is in the database of open-relay servers identified as spammers, the incoming email is refused.
7. SPF verification
Just like Caller ID, SPF (Sender Policy Framework), an emerging standard for domain authentication, helps counter forged "From" addresses in email. Using SPF in Kerio MailServer provides better guarantee that the email came from the domain that it asserts it came from.
SPF requires the owner of an Internet domain to modify DNS records and specify which servers are authorized to transmit e-mail for that domain.
8. Microsoft Caller ID verification
Using Microsoft Caller ID anti-spam technology, Kerio MailServer checks whether an incoming email is actually being sent by the authorized mail server for that domain (hence the name, Caller ID). Kerio MailServer will decline all email messages with forged "From" addresses.
As a side effect, publishing own Caller ID also helps companies protect their reputation by eliminating the possibility of having their domain name hijacked for spam purposes.
To try Caller ID, just visit www.kerio.com/callerid and enter a mail domain in the search field.
9. Sender's domain verification
Rejects emails when sender's email address is using an invalid or fake domain name.
10. Custom filtering by address, subject, content or size
Can reject emails from notorious spammers not known to public blacklists. Allows for the creation of a custom blacklist. An efficient measure to fight against empty "From" fields in spam emails.
11. SMTP authorization by user name and password
Requires users to authenticate before sending email through SMTP.
12. SMTP authorization by IP address
Limits SMTP relay access to specified range of IP addresses. Relay access is usually allowed for users within local area networks (LAN).
13. "Sent email per hour" quota
Limits number of emails that one user (IP address) can send within a specific time period. Significantly reduces the risk of mail server abuse if spammer has accidentally acquired trusted user access rights.
14. "Concurrent connection" limit
Limits number of concurrent SMTP connections made from one IP address (one user). Protects mail server resources by limiting mail load. Prevents the use of specially designed spam programs that create multiple connections to increase the number of emails being sent to SMTP server.
Email, Calendaring and Collaboration
As a Microsoft Exchange alternative, Kerio MailServer provides access to shared calendars, shared contacts and email from Microsoft® Outlook, Microsoft Entourage, and Kerio WebMail, while delivering lower TCO and a better overall email management experience for SMBs.
Groupware
More than just email, Kerio MailServer help groups and individuals work more productively with features such as group calendaring, conference room scheduling and contacts sharing. With flexible client compatibility, email, calendar, contacts, notes and tasks can be accessed from any platform, anytime and anywhere.
Kerio MailServer provides greater interoperability between Mac and PC clients than Microsoft Exchange, enhancing group productivity and collaboration.
Supported groupware clients
Windows clients:Outlook 2000/XP/2003/2007
Windows Mail and Windows Calendar in Windows Vista
Mac clients:Microsoft Entourage X/2004/2008
Apple Mail, Address Book and iCal
Web browser:Kerio WebMail
Mobile devices:Treo, Windows Mobile, and Symbian
BlackBerry through NotifyLink, Apple iPhone
Supported operating systems
Kerio MailServer runs on Windows 2000/XP/2003/Vista/2008, server and non-server editions, Red Hat Linux, SUSE Linux, OpenSUSE, CentOS and Mac OS X. Kerio MailServer also comes in a CentOS virtual appliance.
03.09.2010
