Managed Email Security & Advanced Threat Protection for South African Enterprise

Mimecast adds an independent, specialist email layer in front of Microsoft 365, with separate threat intelligence, sandboxing and URL rewriting, plus continuity if Microsoft 365 itself is down. FirstNet also runs the tuning, threat workflows and DMARC programme for you.

Mimecast is inbound protection: it stops phishing and malware reaching your users. SendMarc is outbound brand protection: it stops anyone spoofing your domain to attack your customers and suppliers. Most organisations need both.

Not with a phased approach. Every legitimate sending source is identified and authenticated before enforcement, policy moves through quarantine with rollback guardrails, and only then reaches reject.

It depends on how many sending sources you have and how quickly your platform owners can make authentication changes. We scope the journey during discovery rather than committing to a date upfront.

No. An archive captures every inbound and outbound message under enforced retention, indexed for eDiscovery and legal hold. A backup is a point-in-time copy for restoring lost mailboxes. Most regulated organisations need both.

FirstNet's Rapid Response desk, 24/7, by email, phone or portal. Platform issues are escalated to Mimecast or SendMarc by FirstNet, so you never deal with the vendor directly.

DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance) is the email standard that lets you tell receiving mail servers what to do with messages that falsely claim to come from your domain. It works with SPF and DKIM. Without DMARC enforcement, anyone can put your domain in the From line of an email, which is how most business email compromise, invoice fraud and executive-impersonation attacks work. Only an enforced policy of p=reject actually blocks this spoofing.

No. SPF only declares which mail servers are allowed to send for your domain, and attackers can still spoof the address your recipients actually see. DMARC is needed to enforce the check: it requires the visible From domain to align with an authenticated SPF or DKIM domain, and tells receiving mail providers to quarantine or reject mail that fails. Many organisations have an SPF record but no alignment and no enforced DMARC policy, which leaves their domain open to impersonation.

BIMI (Brand Indicators for Message Identification) displays your verified brand logo next to your emails in supporting mailbox clients such as Gmail, Apple Mail and Yahoo. It only works once your DMARC policy is enforced at p=quarantine or p=reject. Most mailbox providers also require a Verified Mark Certificate, which is backed by a registered trade mark. FirstNet's optional BIMI add-on covers the BIMI record, logo hosting and help procuring the certificate.

A baseline DMARC report shows every system sending email as your domain. FirstNet publishes a monitoring-only DMARC record (or uses your existing one) and collects the reports that receiving mail providers send back, usually over two reporting cycles. Each source is then classified as legitimate, a forwarder or unauthorised. Most organisations discover far more senders than expected, often 15 to 40 sources including marketing platforms, ERP and finance systems, and some they do not recognise.

No. DMARC protects only your real domain, stopping attackers from sending email that uses your exact address. It does not stop criminals registering look-alike or typo-squat domains that resemble yours. FirstNet offers an optional brand-impersonation takedown add-on to SendMarc that detects look-alike domains and phishing infrastructure and runs a takedown workflow. Inbound protection such as Mimecast also helps detect look-alike domains in email reaching your staff.

Less than a do-it-yourself project, but some. FirstNet engineers identify every sending source and specify the SPF and DKIM changes needed across Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, marketing platforms, ERP and bespoke applications. Your administrators then make those DNS and platform changes under FirstNet's guidance, and FirstNet validates them. Progress through each enforcement step depends on how quickly your platform owners complete these changes, so having them engaged early keeps the project moving.

Yes, if Mimecast email continuity is included in your contracted service. Continuity gives users a failover email experience so they can keep sending and receiving during a Microsoft 365 outage, through Outlook for Windows and Mac, a web interface or mobile apps. FirstNet designs a continuity runbook during onboarding and supports activation and communication during an outage. Continuity is an optional capability, so confirm it is in scope if this matters to your business.

FirstNet delivers the Mimecast managed service from South Africa, and the Mimecast platform supports South African data residency preferences. If your organisation needs specific contractual residency wording or mapping to regulatory controls, these requests are reviewed by FirstNet's product and legal teams before any commitment is made. Compliance remains a shared responsibility, depending on both the platform and your own configuration and governance.

FirstNet offers Mimecast email security in three tiers: Essentials, Resilience and Complete. Essentials is a stronger front-door filter for spam, phishing and malware with safer links and attachments. Resilience, the usual starting point, adds impersonation and business email compromise protection, managed DMARC and, where contracted, continuity and awareness training. Complete adds advanced brand protection and long-term archiving and eDiscovery for regulated or high-risk organisations.

FirstNet reduces this risk by starting with a safe baseline policy, monitoring results and continuously tuning allow and block rules to cut false positives. Clear quarantine and release workflows are set up so users and administrators can recover legitimate messages quickly. Ongoing tuning is part of the managed service rather than a one-off setup task, so the policies keep adjusting as your mail flow and threat patterns change.