WASHINGTON, D.C. — BITS, the business strategy and technology group for the Financial Services Roundtable, is urging its members to adopt what it calls three key e-mail security protocols within the next 18 months.

The group also is urging those financial institutions to continue working with Internet service providers and other organizations combating spam, phishing and e-mail deployed malware. The three protocols are:

oTransport Layer Security (TLS), which automatically authenticates servers and encrypts e-mail messages between servers. oSender Authentication, which validates that received e-mail originates from only the authorized mail servers within a particular domain. Broad implementation should reduce the amount of fraudulent email received by customers who should therefore be less likely to respond to phishing attacks and other malicious email-based attacks. oDomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM), which authenticates e-mail using digital signatures based on cryptographic keys and algorithms. DKIM helps a receiving institution authenticate senders and validate the authenticity of messages.