Sometimes, we are required to use faxing for communication. Fax is very hard to hack, and that’s because faxes are transmitted across regular phone lines rather than the Internet. Unfortunately, to send a traditional fax, you must print off your fax in order to send it with a regular fax machine. What if you want to avoid printing sensitive documents, though? The way to avoid printing is to send a fax from Gmail.
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Avoid Printing Sensitive Documents and Send a Fax From Gmail
Traditional faxing sends documents across phone lines, and this system has been in place since the mid-20th century. Because the phone lines are not possible to hack in the same way that the Internet can be hacked, there are certain industries and entities that prefer to use faxing these days in order to send sensitive documents. It’s fairly common for contracts, especially with international businesses, private medical data, and government or legal documents, to be sent by fax.
One of the downsides of traditional faxing, aside from the expense of maintaining a phone line dedicated to an outdated fax machine and the problem of ensuring that your fax went through correctly, is that you must print out whatever documents you want to send. Basically, you print it out so that you can scan it again using the special hardware of the fax machine.
Skip the Printing
If you use Gmail to send a fax, you can skip the printing step entirely. You can simply attach your sensitive documents to your email to send them. These documents can be stored on your computer, or they can come from Google Drive, Dropbox, or other data storage accounts.
How to Send a Fax With Email
To send a fax using email, all you need is an account with an Internet fax service provider. A good provider will securely transmit your fax using international faxing protocol standards. Once you have signed up with a fax provider, you will simply compose an email as normal on your computer or mobile device.
Address It Correctly
In the address area of your email, you will put your recipient’s phone number with no special spaces or characters, followed by the suffix of your fax service provider. That means you will end up with something in your address line that looks like this: 4445556767@rcfax.com. If you are faxing internationally, you add the country code of the country you’re faxing to and any area code.
Attach Documents
Attach the documents you want to send in the same way as you would attach documents to an email. Be sure that you do not copy and paste documents into the email body. Nothing in the email body will be sent. You can attach any type of document, but if you have sensitive documents, it’s usually best to use PDF.
Add a Cover Letter
For sensitive documents, a cover letter is usually a good idea. This cover letter will protect your documents from being read by anyone passing by your recipient’s fax machine before your recipient can actually get to the fax. Type your cover letter into the subject line of your email.
Choose Wisely
If you need to send a sensitive document, it matters who you choose for your fax service. There are services out there that promise to send your fax for free, but “free” services have to make their money somewhere. Usually, they have lax security protocols and might even print ads on your fax! Go with a professional and established company with good security.
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