Of course, we can’t talk about safety and security when sending and receiving emails without discussing email encryption.

Encryption encodes the contents of an email until the recipient decodes them. The point of encrypting emails is to protect sensitive information from identity thieves.

One way of achieving secure emails is through SSL, and another is TLS.

I’ve mentioned both but not discussed them in much detail, so let’s change that!

Starting with SSL, this encryption protocol was created in 1995. It walked so TLS can run, as that’s the more modern encryption method.

SSL performs a handshake (digitally, of course) to authenticate both devices while also creating a digital data signature attesting to the accuracy and purity of the data (aka, no one’s tampered with it).

Since 1999, it’s been all about TLS, which also encrypts emails or websites, but better than SSL. It, too, uses handshake protocols to ensure the veracity of the devices and creates TLS records.