Password-protected Fax Receiving
Can you recommend a small business fax machine that has password-protected receiving?
Password-protected fax or “secure receive” is a fax machine option that may be preferred by professionals in the legal or medical industry, or perhaps top-secret government agents, who are especially concerned about privacy or share a fax machine among several associates.
There are several machines on the market that offer a secure receive feature. One is the Sharp UXB700E; another is Brother’s IntelliFax-2380c, which costs about the same as a regular fax machine. On the higher end is the $2,000 Xerox F116L dual line fax machine, which supports secure fax codes for up to 98 users. When you are shopping for a fax machine with password-protection, be sure you find one with secure receive or private receive, not just a secure mailbox, which in some cases refers instead to voice messages. Ricoh sells machines that have a key lock to further restrict access to faxes.
When a fax is sent to a machine with password-protected receive mode activated, the pages will be stored in the machine’s memory and won’t print them without the correct password being entered. Sending doesn’t change.
However, password-protection measures aren’t required by HIPAA. Besides typical measures of care, there are other above-and-beyond measures that can be taken to send faxes securely. For example: 128-bit PDF encryption; using FTP over SSL to a secure server; via encrypted email; or via an https API. Secure fax services such as Innoport charge a fee to ensure faxes are sent this way.
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