In the age of evasive quishing and GenAI powered cyber attacks, email security remains a critical battleground for organizations. One prevalent method employed in this fight is URL rewriting, also known as “time of click protection”. This technique, which is widely used by legacy email security solutions like Secure Email Gateways (SEGs) and even by some newer next-gen solutions like Avanan, focuses on modifying all links within email messages to enhance security.

URL rewriting involves altering every URL in an email in order to redirect through a security server or checkpoint before reaching its intended destination. It has two main purposes: analyzing the link against known threat databases, and verifying its safety before allowing end users to access it. This approach, while effective against certain types of malicious links, often gives organizations a false sense of security. The reliance on static detection means that only known threats are intercepted, leaving a gap for novel or evasive attacks to slip through.

While this method has been foundational in email security, it is increasingly challenged by the dynamic nature of today’s threats. Attackers are constantly devising new strategies to bypass traditional defenses, making it imperative for email security solutions to evolve. This is where advanced techniques like dynamic URL analysis come into play, representing a significant shift from the reactive nature of URL rewriting to a more proactive, real-time approach in threat detection and prevention.

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