Systems and methods for protecting email data

• US 10,671,566 B2
• Filed: 03/16/2017
• Issued: 06/02/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 03/13/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: CommVault Systems Incorporated
• Original Assignee: CommVault Systems Incorporated
• Inventors: Ahn, Jun H., Krishnan, Sesha N., Liu, Yan
• Primary Examiner(s): Corrielus, Jean M
• Application Number:
  US15/461,182
• Publication Number:
  US 20170228387A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,174 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/113 Details of archiving lifecycle management in storage systems G06F3/0649; backup systems G06F11/1446
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/125 characterised by the use of retention policies retention policies for HSM systems G06F16/185
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/6209 to a single file or object, e.g. in a secure envelope, encrypted and accessed using a key, or with access control rules appended to the object itself
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 51/212 using filtering or selective blocking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/10 for controlling access to devices or network resources

Abstract

Aspects of this disclosure relate to protecting email data. For example, email protection rules can instruct an email server to route an email to an email protection module. The one or more email rules can identify a group of one or more email addresses. The email protection module can receive an email from the email server that has an email address of the group as an intended receipt. The email protection module can route the email to secondary storage and store the email in secondary storage to create a secondary copy of the email. The secondary copy can be stored inline to persistent memory of secondary storage, according to certain embodiments. Access to the backup copy of the email stored to the persistent memory can be controlled, for example, based on whether a user had permission to access to the email when the email was sent.

Claims

1. A networked data storage system for protecting email data using email protection rules, the system comprising:

at least one client computing device comprising a first application configured to generate emails;

a second computing device comprising one or more hardware processors;

one or more email protection rules provided in at least one storage device, the email protection rules comprising criteria,

wherein an email server application transmits emails generated by the first application to recipients, and additionally transmits at least some of the emails generated by the first application for processing by the one or more hardware processors of the second computing device,

wherein the one or more hardware processors of the second computing device are programmed to;

receive at least a first email from the email server application; and

based at least partly on the criteria of the email protection rules, identify a secondary storage computing device of a plurality of secondary storage computing devices to which to transmit the first email received from the email server application,

wherein subsequent to identification of the secondary storage computing device by the one or more hardware processors of the second computing device, the first email is transmitted to the identified secondary storage computing device for processing as part of an operation in which a secondary copy of the first email is created and stored.

2. The system of claim 1, further comprising an application-specific data agent that interfaces with the first application of the client computing device to perform information management operations on files generated by the client computing device.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the first email is sent to an email address associated with the second computing device using an email protocol, and the first email is transmitted to the identified secondary storage computing device without using an email protocol.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein user access to the secondary copy of the first email is based at least partly on whether a user had permission to access the first email when the first email was received by the one or more hardware processors of the second computing device.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the secondary copy of the first email is stored in-line with transmission of the first email to the one or more recipients of the first email.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the email server application is not involved in creation or storage of the secondary copy of the first email subsequent to transmitting the first email for processing by the one or more hardware processors of the second computing device.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the secondary copy of the first email is created and stored transparent to the email server application.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the email server application does not reside on the second computing device.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the criteria lists a group of email addresses and specifies that only emails associated with the group of email addresses will be transmitted for processing by the one or more hardware processors of the second computing device.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the client computing device and the second computing device reside in a primary storage subsystem of the data storage system, and wherein the secondary storage computing devices reside in a secondary storage subsystem of the data storage system.

11. A computer-implemented method of protecting email data using email protection rules, the method comprising:

with an email server application, transmitting emails generated by a first application executing on at least one client computing device to one or more recipients of the emails;

transmitting with the email server application a subset of the emails generated by the first application to an email protection processor which executes on one or more computer processors;

with the email protection processor, receiving at least a first email from the email server application, the first email belonging to the subset of the emails;

accessing from at least one storage device a set of email protection rules comprising criteria;

based at least partly on the criteria of the email protection rules, identifying with the email protection processor a secondary storage computing device of a plurality of secondary storage computing devices to which to transmit the first email received from the email server application,

wherein subsequent to identification of the secondary storage computing device by the email protection processor, the first email is transmitted to the identified secondary storage computing device for processing as part of an operation in which a secondary copy of the first email is created and stored.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, further comprising interfacing with the first application using an application-specific data agent to perform information management operations on files generated by the client computing device.

13. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein said transmitting with the email server application the subset of the emails comprises transmitting the first email to an email address associated with the email protection processor using an email protocol, and wherein the first email is transmitted to the identified secondary storage computing device without using an email protocol.

14. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein user access to the secondary copy of the first email is based at least partly on whether a user had permission to access the first email when the first email was received by the email protection processor.

15. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the secondary copy of the first email is stored in-line with transmission of the first email to the one or more recipients of the first email.

16. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the email server application is not involved in creation or storage of the secondary copy of the first email subsequent to transmission of the first email to the email protection processor.

17. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the secondary copy of the first email is created and stored transparent to the email server application.

18. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the email server application and the email protection processor reside on different computing devices.

19. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the criteria lists a group of email addresses and specifies that only emails associated with the group of email addresses will be transmitted to the email protection processor.

20. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the client computing device and the email protection processor reside in a primary storage subsystem, and wherein the secondary storage computing devices reside in a secondary storage subsystem.