How often has the final demise of email been prophesied? Sometimes it was supposed to be replaced by messaging portals, sometimes by social media portals as the primary communication and collaboration channel. But none of this has happened. It is still indispensable in our ultra-mobile everyday lives. With innovative concepts and functional enhancements, email is now ready for new tasks and application scenarios.
Multifunctional mailboxes or shared mailboxes are a highly useful extension of business and official email communication. They facilitate ultra-mobile teamwork and simplify central administration. With shared mailboxes, the account is no longer person-related, but function-related. This means that it no longer applies to a user identified by name, but to a defined group of authorized users. This means that several people have shared access to one or more mailboxes. Access is defined by their functional differentiation, e.g. membership of a team or group, their tasks or responsibilities. Typical areas of application are support departments, assistant and deputy functions or role-defined responsibilities. If, for example, the head of unit in an authority changes, the successor immediately has access to all emails in a function mailbox as soon as he/she is authenticated for it via server activation. This facilitates assignment, improves usability and simplifies the communication flow.
Materna Virtual Solution now also makes shared mailboxes available for mobile communication and collaboration at the highest security level. The corresponding Microsoft Exchange functionality has been integrated as a module (Team-Mails) in the highly secure ultra-mobile system solution SecurePIM Government SDS. This means that multifunctional mailboxes are now also available for mobile use at the security-critical level of classified information in accordance with VS-NfD ready. Confidential emails in a functional mailbox can be read, sent and managed by all authorized users at any time and from anywhere – all at no extra cost. The module is integrated into the communication and collaboration solution as standard, is available free of charge and only needs to be activated by the administration team.
Account members also have access to the integrated calendar and document modules from a functional mailbox. In the next step, it is planned to also be able to read, send and manage encrypted emails. Another important new feature will be the push notification function. Every authorized user of a multifunctional mailbox will then be able to activate the corresponding messages with a simple click. In the near future, so-called public folders will also allow access to shared mailboxes as an additional technology variant.