Protecting Email Header Fields by Embedding in Message Body
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing secure email protocols do not effectively protect the integrity and confidentiality of header fields in electronic mail messages, allowing tampering with header content during transmission, as only the message body is typically encrypted or signed, not the header fields.
Innovation Solution
Inserting the contents of header fields to be protected into the message body before encoding and transmission, allowing existing secure communication protocols to encrypt and sign the message body, which includes the protected header field contents, ensuring their integrity and confidentiality.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If only the message body is encrypted or signed, then the encryption/Signing process remains simple and fast, but the header fields are vulnerable to tampering and lack integrity protection
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the message into two parts: the original message body (which remains simple and fast to process) and the protected header fields (which are inserted into a new message body for encryption/signing). This allows different parts of the message to have different protection levels, resolving the contradiction between comprehensive protection and processing simplicity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces an intermediary structure (a new message body container) that holds the protected header fields. This intermediary allows the header fields to be encrypted and signed without affecting the original message body processing, enabling integrity protection while maintaining overall system simplicity.
2Reliability
If header fields are not protected, then message transmission remains fast and simple, but header integrity can be compromised during transmission
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by inserting the header fields into a protected message body structure before transmission. This preparatory step ensures that when the message is transmitted, the header fields are already protected against tampering, achieving integrity without requiring complex real-time protection mechanisms during transmission.
3Reliability
If existing secure protocols are used only for message body, then protocol implementation remains simple, but header fields lack confidentiality
Solution Approach 1:
The patent makes the existing secure communication protocol multi-functional by using it to protect both the original message body and the header fields (through insertion into the message body). This universal approach allows the same protocol to provide confidentiality for different message components without requiring separate specialized protocols, thus achieving enhanced confidentiality while maintaining implementation simplicity.
Data Source
AI summary
Embodiments of the systems and methods described herein facilitate the transmitting, receiving, and processing of encoded messages wherein the header fields in the message header are protected. In one embodiment, the contents of the header fields to be protected are inserted into the message body as one or more additional lines of text, for example, prior to encoding and transmitting the message to a message recipient. Upon receipt of the message, the message recipient processes the encoded message such that the contents of the protected header fields can be extracted from the message body. Accordingly, by inserting the contents of the header fields to be protected into the message body, the header fields may be protected using existing standards and protocols for facilitating secure message communication.