McAfee Email Gateway, formerly IronMail, provides inbound and outbound protection against spam, viruses, data leakage and other messaging threats. The product integrates with many existing SMTP architectures.
Installation of the appliance was very easy and straightforward and we were up and running within a few minutes. At first glance, the user interface of the device seems a little bit counterintuitive. We were not sure which items were going to present us with a configuration page or show us a graphical statistic.
Additionally, we had a slight problem with navigation using Internet Explorer 8; this was easily fixed by reverting to compatibility mode. The dashboard views seemed a bit overcrowded as well.
Aside from a few minor UI issues, the rest of the Email Gateway is full of powerful features. It combines lots of configuration options for anti-spam, anti-virus, policy, content analysis and encryption. Once a user is acclimatised to the system, configuring the various protection options is fairly easy. The appliance itself is very admin-friendly, with lots of alerting, logging, auditing and reporting features. Encryption is handled at the gateway and message level using TLS, S/MIME or integrating with PGP.
McAfee also has a particular on-box delivery system for message-based encryption. When a policy makes a decision that a particular message needs to be encrypted, the Email Gateway can utilise push (delivery) or pull (notification) mechanisms for the recipient to be able to retrieve and decrypt the message directly on the appliance itself. An option that some may find useful is integration with a separate McAfee Data Loss Prevention server (not part of this review).
Documentation for the product and user support via the McAfee website are excellent.
Support options are based on the tier of support and the overall cost of the purchase and include hardware support, various tiers of access to certified technicians, high-level dedicated consultants and account managers.
We find McAfee Email Gateway to be good value for money. It is a strong product with lots of powerful features.