Token-Based Email Phishing Prevention via Identity Pseudonymization
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Current information security technologies are inadequate for reliably and efficiently detecting and preventing phishing threats, particularly as they often fail to distinguish between legitimate and spoofed email addresses.
Innovation Solution
The system uses a token-email address mapping table to pseudonymize sender and receiver identities, generating one-time use tokens to authenticate email messages and prevent unauthorized access, thereby detecting and blocking phishing threats.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If email addresses are exposed in public network zones for communication, then email communication functionality is enabled, but email addresses become vulnerable to unauthorized access and phishing attacks
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces tokens as intermediary elements that mediate between email addresses and communication processes. Instead of exposing email addresses directly in network zones, the system uses tokens to represent and facilitate email communication. The tokens are placed in network zones while the actual email addresses remain protected in secure storage, thus enabling communication functionality while preventing unauthorized access to the actual email addresses.
2Reliability
If tokens are generated and stored in a token-email address mapping table, then phishing threat detection capability is improved, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the authentication system into distinct components: a token generation module, a token-email address mapping table, and a verification module. This segmentation allows the system to maintain simplicity in each individual component while achieving robust phishing detection through their coordinated interaction. The mapping table stores only token-email address pairs without exposing the complexity of the underlying authentication mechanisms.
3Object-affected harmful factors
If email addresses are pseudonymized using tokens, then security against phishing is enhanced, but ability to trace and verify sender identity becomes more difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a feedback mechanism where the receiving device verifies tokens against the secure storage system to confirm sender identity. When an email is received, the system checks whether the accompanying token exists in the token-email address mapping table and corresponds to the claimed sender. This feedback loop enables identity verification without exposing the sender's actual email address to the network zone, thus maintaining both security and verifiability.
Data Source
AI summary
A system for communicating email messages using tokens receives a request to send an email message to a receiver. The email message is associated with a sender's email address. The system determines whether the sender's email address is associated with a token from a plurality of tokens stored in a token-email address mapping table. The system generates a particular token for the sender's email address in response to determining that the sender's email address is not associated with a token, where the particular token uniquely identifies the sender's email address. The system sends the email message using the particular token instead of the sender's email address, such that the sender's email address remains anonymous from the perspective of the receiver.