Yahoo and Cisco Join Forces and Products to Develop DKIM (Domain Keys + Identified Internet Mail)   - 1,697 Views, 1 Comment

Domain Keys, which was announced last year, is Yahoo’s entry into the email authentication space.

“Yahoo is receiving more than 350 million messages signed by DomainKeys per day. By collaborating with key industry players like Cisco and technology visionaries like Eric Allman of Sendmail, we can offer a solution that addresses the problem of e-mail forgery today, and increases the level of defense against fraudulent e-mails and phishing attacks,” said Yahoo’s anti-spam product manager, Miles Libby.

Added Jim Fenton, a distinguished engineer with Cisco Systems, “E-mail fraud is a global problem that ultimately costs companies millions of dollars in direct losses, technology expenditures, lost productivity and even network downtime. In accordance with our commitment to standards, Cisco is pleased to join forces with key partners such as Yahoo on the development of an effective solution that significantly mitigates the impact of e-mail fraud on both consumers and businesses.”

The system is based on public-key cryptography, using a public key for receiving systems, served up at the DNS level, with sending systems including a private key in their outbound email headers.