System and method for compressing secure e-mail for exchange with a mobile data communication device

A system for reducing the size of an encrypted message for transmission to a wireless mobile communication device, the system comprising:

• a host system configured to receive an encrypted message from a message sender and addressed to message receivers, the encrypted message including an encrypted message body and an encrypted session key for each message receiver;
• and
• a wireless connector system associated with the host system and configured to determine whether any of the message receivers has a corresponding wireless mobile connection device and if so, for each message receiver that has a corresponding wireless mobile communication device, to generate a reduced size encrypted message containing the message body and the encrypted session key only for the message receiver and to transmit the reduced size encrypted message to the wireless mobile communication device, wherein at least two of the encrypted session keys for the message receivers were encrypted via public keys that are electronically available from different companies over a network to which the host system is connected;
• wherein the encrypted message is encrypted according to Pretty Good Privacy (PGP), and wherein a second encrypted message is handled by the host system for transmission to the wireless mobile communication device, wherein the second encrypted message is a Secure Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (S/MIME) e-mail message.

A system for reducing the size of an encrypted message at a host system before the message is transmitted to a wireless mobile communication device, said system comprising:

• means for receiving at the host system an encrypted message from a message sender addressed to first and second message receivers, the encrypted message including an encrypted message body and an encrypted session key for each of the message receivers;
• means for generating at the host system a first reduced size encrypted message that contains the encrypted message body and the encrypted session key for the first message receiver, the first reduced size encrypted message not including the encrypted session key for the second message receiver;
• and
• means for transmitting the first reduced size encrypted message to a wireless mobile communication device that corresponds to the first message receiver,
• wherein the encrypted session keys were encrypted via public keys that are electronically available from different companies over a network to which the host system is connected,
• wherein different electronic security messaging approaches are used to encrypt messages sent to the host system, and
• wherein the encrypted message is encrypted according to Pretty Good Privacy (PGP), and wherein a second encrypted message is handled by the host system for transmission to the wireless mobile communication device, wherein the second encrypted message is a Secure Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (S/MIME) e-mail message.

A method of processing an encoded message at a host system before the message is transmitted to a wireless mobile communication device, the method comprising the steps of:

• receiving at the host system the encoded message from a message sender addressed to a plurality of message receivers;
• wherein at least portions of the encoded message were encoded via electronic asymmetric security keys that are electronically available from different companies over a network to which the host system is connected;
• determining whether any of the message receivers has a corresponding wireless mobile communication device;
• and
• for each message receiver that has a corresponding wireless mobile communication device:
• processing the message so as to modify the message with respect to an encoding aspect, said encoding aspect being, selected from the group consisting of an encryption aspect, an authentication aspect, and combinations thereof;
• and
• transmitting the processed message to the connecting wireless mobile communication device;
• wherein the encoded message is a reduced-size encoded message;
• wherein the encoded message is encrypted according to Pretty Good Privacy (PGP), and wherein a second encoded message is handled by the host system for transmission to the wireless mobile communication device, wherein the second encoded message is a Secure Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (S/MIME) e-mail message.