Perimeter message filtering with extracted user-specific preferences

A method for utilizing recipient-specific messaging preferences of messaging recipients residing in a trusted network to bypass content filtering of preferred incoming messages corresponding to each of the recipients as the messages are received in a perimeter network outside the trusted network, said method comprising:

• extracting recipient-specific messaging preferences from one or more mailboxes associated with each of the message recipients residing in the trusted network, said trusted network being separated from the perimeter network by at least one interior firewall;
• hashing at least two portions of at least one of the extracted recipient-specific messaging preferences using a hashing function;
• populating the hashed recipient-specific messaging preferences into a distributed directory service administered on at least one server in the trusted network;
• propagating the hashed recipient-specific messaging preferences from said distributed directory service to a stand-alone directory service administered on at least one edge server in the perimeter network via the interior firewall, said perimeter network being separate from and outside the trusted network, wherein the perimeter network and a network outside the perimeter network are separated by at least one outer firewall;
• providing the hashed messaging preferences information from the stand-alone directory service to a content filter residing in the perimeter network;
• excluding preferred messages identified by the provided hashed messaging preferences from content scanning by the content filter;
• querying the one or more mailboxes associated with each of the messaging recipients to determine if recipient-specific messaging preferences stored in the stand-alone directory service are different than those populated on the distributed directory service;
• and
• repeating the extracting, populating, propagating, and providing when it is determined that the messaging preferences stored in the stand-alone directory service have changed.