Hermes SEG User Guide

• Accessing the User Console
• User Console Login
• Report Settings
• Sender Filters
• Change Password
• Message History

Accessing the User Console

The User Console can ONLY be accessed by clicking on any of the links or buttons on the daily Hermes Secure Email Gateway Daily Quarantine Report or the scheduled Hermes Secure Email Gateway Scheduled Quarantine Report.

Hermes Secure Email Gateway Daily Quarantine Report

The Hermes Secure Email Gateway Daily Quarantine Report is a report that Hermes SEG generates on a daily basis and delivers to each user's mailbox. The report MAY contain any emails from the previous day that the system has quarantined and did NOT deliver to the user's mailbox. By default ALL users receive this report on a daily basis regardless if the report contains quarantined emails.

Hermes Secure Email Gateway Scheduled Quarantine Report

The Hermes Secure Email Gateway Scheduled Quarantine Report is a report that Hermes SEG generates on 2, 4 or 8 hour intervals (depending on configuration) and delivers to a user's mailbox providing that the user was configured to receive this report. The report MAY contain any emails from the same day that the system has quarantined and did NOT deliver to the user's mailbox. By default this report is NOT send to any users unless those users have been specifically configured to receive this report.

Each report contains the following links:

• Report Settings - Clicking this link will direct you to the Report Settings where you can adjust the settings for this report.
• Message History - Clicking this link will direct you to Message History where you can search, view/download and release email messages to your mailbox.
• Sender Filters - Clicking this link will direct you to the Sender Filters where you can create block/allow filters for outside email addresses.
• Online Help - Clicking this link will direct you to the Hermes SEG Online Help where you can read detailed instructions on how to use each part of the User Console (Figure 1).

Figure 1

Additionally, if quarantined messages exist, the following buttons will be next to each quarantined message:

• View Msg - Clicking this button will direct you to the User Console where you can view and/or download that particular message (provided your email address has been configured by your administrator to be able to download messages).
• Release Msg - Clicking this button will direct you to the User Console where the system will release and deliver that message to your mailbox (provided that the message is not archived) (Figure 2).

Figure 2

User Console Login

First Time User Console Login

• The first time you access the User Self-Service Portal, you will be prompted to Set Password. Click on the Send Code button (Figure 1).

Figure 1

• The system will send a Set User Console Password message to your e-mail address. Click on the Reset Password link in the e-mail (Figure 2):

Figure 2

• In the Set New Password page, enter a new password (at least 8 characters), ideally leave the Check against haveibeenpwned.com drop-down set to YES and click the Submit button (Figure 3):

Figure 3

• After successfully setting the password, click on the click here link located on the top of the window to login (Figure 4) or alternatively use one of the links in a Hermes Secure Email Gateway Daily Quarantine Report or a Hermes Secure Email Gateway Scheduled Quarantine Report.

Figure 4

 

 

User Portal Login

1. Verify your email address appears in the Email Address field (this field cannot be modified).
2. Enter your password in the Password field.
3. Click on the Sign In button (Figure 1).

Figure 1

 

Forgot Password to the User Console

• Click on the Forgot Password? button on the bottom right of the User Console Login page (Figure 4).

Figure 1

2. The system will re-direct you to the Reset Password page. Click on the Send Code button (Figure 2).

Figure 2

• The system will send a Set User Console Password message to your e-mail address. Click on the Reset Password link in the e-mail (Figure 2):

Figure 2

• In the Set New Password page, enter a new password (at least 8 characters), ideally leave the Check against haveibeenpwned.com drop-down set to YES and click the Submit button (Figure 3):

Figure 3

• After successfully setting the password, click on the click here link located on the top of the window to login (Figure 4) or alternatively use one of the links in a Hermes Secure Email Gateway Daily Quarantine Report or a Hermes Secure Email Gateway Scheduled Quarantine Report.

Figure 4

Report Settings

Every night starting at 12:30 a.m., Hermes SEG sends Daily Quarantine Reports to all the recipients in the system. The Daily Quarantine Reports functionality is two fold. First, it provides customized links to the User Console for each recipient and a listing of any quarantined messages.  This default functionality can be changed by editing the Report Settings in the User Console.

Enable Quarantine Reports Regardless if quarantined messages exist

By setting this option, Hermes SEG will send a quarantined report on the interval set by the Quarantine Report Frequency drop-down. Setting a Daily report frequency will generate a report for the previous day's quarantined messages. Setting Every 2, 4 or 8 Hours Report Frequency will generate a report for the previous 2, 4 or 8 hours of quarantined messages. If there are no quarantined messages, the report will be empty (Figure 1).

Figure 1

Enable Quarantine Reports Only if quarantined messages exist

By setting this option, Hermes SEG will send a quarantined report on the interval set by the Quarantine Report Frequency drop-down. Setting a Daily report frequency will generate a report for the previous day's quarantined messages. Setting Every 2, 4 or 8 Hours Report Frequency will generate a report for the previous 2, 4 or 8 hours of quarantined messages. If there are no quarantined messages, the report will NOT be sent (Figure 2):

Figure 2

Disable Quarantine Reports

By setting this option, Hermes SEG will not send a quarantine report for your email address regardless if quarantined messages exist or not. This option is not recommended unless you have a specific need (Figure 1).

Figure 1

 

Sender Filters

Sender Filters permits you to either Block or Allow sender email addresses or sender domains. Setting an action of ALLOW will only bypass the sender in the Spam filter. E-mails with banned files or malware will still be blocked. Only your Hermes SEG Administrator can set to allow for those types of e-mails.

Add Email Address

• Click the Add Sender button and in the resultant window enter an e-mail address in the Sender E-mail Address or Domain field, select either Allow or Block in the Select Action to Take drop-down and click the Submit button (Figure 1):

Figure 1

 

Add Domain

• Click the Add Sender button and in the resultant window enter a domain in the Sender E-mail Address or Domain field, select either Allow or Block in the Select Action to Take drop-down and click the Submit button. If you wish to include all the the sub-domains under a root domain then you would simply enter a (.) dot in front of the domain. For example, if you want to include all the sub-domains for domain.tld, you would simply enter .domain.tld (note the . in front of the domain) (Figure 1).

Figure 1

 

Delete Sender

• Place a checkmark on the sender(s) you wish to delete and click the Delete Sender(s) button (Figure 1):

Figure 1

• On the resultant Delete Sender(s) confirmation window, click the YES button to delete or NO to cancel (Figure 2).

Figure 2

 

 

Change Password

 

• In the Existing Password field, enter your existing password, in the New Password field, enter the new password you wish to use (passwords must be at least 8 characters long). Ideally leave the Check against haveibeenpwned.com drop-down set to YES in order to check your password against known data breaches and click the Submit button. Click the icon next to the password fields to show the passwords you've typed in order to verify accuracy (Figure 1):

Figure 1

Message History

Message History allows you to search, view, release messages to your mailbox as well as block/allow senders.

By default, Message History shows a maximum of 1000 messages sent to your e-mail address over the past 24 hours. The maximum messages limit can be increased by adjusting the Search Results Limit drop-down to 1500, 2500, 5000, 10000 or 15000 messages. Be aware that limits of 10000 or 15000 will significantly increase page loading time (Figure 1):

Figure 1

Search Messages

Message History relies on Start Date/Time and the End Date/Time to quickly locate messages. It's important that you have a approximate date and time of the message you are searching for best results.

• Adjust the Start Date/Time and the End Date/Time fields by clicking on the icons and adjust the date and time as desired and then click the Fetch Messages button. You can also manually enter the desired date and time (Figure 1):

Figure 1

• Once you have a listing of messages in the desired date/time period, search for the actual message(s) by entering a string or multiple strings separated by a space (E-mail Address, Sender IP Address, Subject, Score, Type or Action) in the Search: field. The system will quickly locate any message(s) that match the string(s) you entered (Figure 2):

Figure 2

Set the Number of Messages to Display

By default the Message History page displays 50 messages at a time. You can select to display 50, 75 or 100 or Show all messages by clicking the Show entries drop-down field (Figure 1).

Figure 1

Sort Messages

All the Column titles in the Message History page can be clicked to sort the messages Ascending (Small to Big) or Descending (Big to Small). Click on the corresponding Column title to sort by the following fields: Archived, Date/Time, Sender IP, Return-Path, From, To, Subject, Score, type or Action (Figure 1):

Figure 1

 

Release Email Messages to your Mailbox

Releasing messages will instruct the system to deliver the messages selected to your mailbox. This action can be performed for any type of message regardless if the message was initially quarantined. This is useful for releasing lost email or releasing quarantined messages that were never delivered to your mailbox.

The system can ONLY release messages that are not archived. Messages that have been archived cannot be released. They can only be viewed and/or downloaded. You can easily see if a message has been archived by looking at the Archived column in the message listing. If it's set to N, then the message has NOT been archived thus it can be released. If it's set to Y then the message has been archived thus it cannot be released. It can only be viewed or downloaded (provided your administrator has allowed you the capability to download messages). 

• Place a checkmark the message(s) you wish to release to your Mailbox (Figure 1).

Figure 1

• Click on the Message Actions button on the top-left and on the resultant Message(s) Actions window, select Release Message(s) to Mailbox in the Action to Take drop-down and click the Submit button (Figure 2):

Figure 2

Block & Allow Senders

Block/Allow rules should NOT be used as a method of spam control. Legitimate mass marketing email campaigns should be handled by unsubscribing from those campaigns.

Setting an action of ALLOW will only bypass the sender in the Spam filter. E-mails with banned files or malware will still be blocked. Only your Hermes SEG Administrator can set to allow for those types of e-mails.

• Place a checkmark the message(s) you wish to block/allow (Figure 1).

Figure 1

• Click on the Message Actions button on the top-left and on the resultant Message(s) Actions window, select either Block Sender to block any future incoming e-mails or Allow Sender to allow any future incoming e-mails in the Action to Take drop-down and click the Submit button (Figure 2):

Figure 2

• This will automatically create rules with either a Block or Allow action under the Sender Filters section using the the email address displayed in the Return-Path column as the Sender.

Most marketing/spam email campaigns will auto generate the From email address each time they send out emails. An auto generated email address will look similar to the example below:

d-3-2492042-40004013-2-1-us2-c2bf84fa@aflac-onlineservices.com

In this example, each time an email goes out from this email campaign, the string before the @ (d-3-2492042-40004013-2-1-us2-c2bf84fa) will always be different while the domain string after the @ (aflac-onlineservices.com) will remain the same. Therefore, creating a block/allow rule using the Return-Path email address is pointless since the Block/Allow rule you previously created will not fire next time an email from this marketing campaign gets received since the string before the @ will be different. In these cases, it's recommended to navigate to the Sender Filters part of the documentation and follow the instructions under the Add Domain  section in order to create a rule by using the domain string after the @ (aflac-onlineservices.com).

Train the Bayes Database

The ability to Train the Bayes Database is disabled by default and can only be enabled and available for your use if your system Administrator has enabled it for your e-mail address. 

NEVER use legitimate mass marketing emails to train the Bayes Database as Spam. Inversely, you should NEVER use spam emails to train the Bayes Database as non-spam. These actions will corrupt the Bayes Database and lead to the system misidentifying spam and non-spam emails. Additionally, you should avoid training the Bayes Database with forwarded spam emails.

• Place a checkmark the message(s) you wish to train the Bayes Database with (Figure 1).

Figure 1

• Click on the Message Actions button on the top-left and on the resultant Message(s) Actions window, select either Train As Spam, Train as Ham or Remove Message(s) Previous Training to train the Bayes database as desired in the Action to Take drop-down and click the Submit button (Figure 2):

Figure 2

View & Download Email Messages

When viewing messages, links and other malicious content is NOT disabled. Ensure you exercise proper caution to prevent any infection on your computer.

• Click on the icon of the message you wish to view and/or download. You will be redirected to the View Message page (Figure 1):

Figure 1

• Click the button to return to the Message History
• If your system Administrator has enabled it, click on the button to download the message to your computer as .eml file
• Click on the button to print the message.