Launch of secure email facility

In January we announced that we were piloting a new email encryption solution. The results from our pilot were positive and, as planned, we will be using email encryption across the service by the end of March.

This solution will enable us to do more work by email but at the same time keep personal information safe. We will encrypt outgoing emails where they, and any attachment to them, contain information that needs to be protected.

A simple password system will be used to open the encrypted email. We always recommend that personal information is sent to us securely too. There is a reply function within our encrypted emails that enables a response to us to be encrypted automatically.

Anyone who wants to send information to us but hasn’t yet had an encrypted email can start the process by getting in touch with us.

We see this as a significant improvement in how we communicate with people involved in complaints made to us and is another step in our long term aim of providing a more accessible, responsive service.