Note: This article is for district IT and security teams.
Informed K12 sends important emails, like form requests, approval reminders, and confirmations, to staff across your district. This article explains how we keep that email secure and trustworthy, and what your IT team can do to make sure it lands in the inbox instead of spam.
In this article, we will review:
- Why Informed K12 emails are trustworthy
- What your district can do
- Adding Informed K12 as a trusted sender, by platform
- Technical reference
- How we keep email secure in transit
- Frequently asked questions
Why Informed K12 Emails Are Trustworthy
Email providers use a few standard checks to make sure a message really came from who it says it did, and wasn't sent by a spammer pretending to be them. Informed K12 passes all of these checks:
- Sender verification (SPF): Confirms our emails come from a server we actually own.
- Message signing (DKIM): Adds a digital signature to every email, so providers can confirm it wasn't tampered with.
- Spoofing protection (DMARC): Tells email providers to send any message that fails the above checks straight to spam, instead of the inbox.
Note: Our DMARC setting is "quarantine," meaning we actively block spoofed messages rather than just monitor for them.
Because our emails pass all three checks, most modern spam filters already trust them more than they'd trust a manual allow list entry.
What Your District Can Do
A manual allow list works, but it can get missed by other filtering layers, or go out of date if our sending address changes. Here's what we recommend instead, in order of effectiveness:
- Check that your spam filter trusts verified senders. Ask your IT team to confirm that Informed K12, which passes all our verification checks, isn't being flagged anyway by other spam-scoring rules.
-
Add Informed K12 to your safe sender list. If your district uses a security gateway (like Proofpoint, Mimecast, or Barracuda) in front of Google or Microsoft, this is usually the easiest and safest option.
a. If your system supports it, set this up as a conditional rule that only trusts mail from forms@informedk12.com when it passes our verification checks.
b. Otherwise, add the whole domain, @informedk12.com, to your safe sender list. - Make sure your mail server supports current encryption standards (TLS). This keeps message content private in transit and is separate from spam filtering.
Adding Informed K12 as a Trusted Sender, by Platform
Each email platform handles "trusted senders" a bit differently. This table shows where to make the change and what it corresponds to above.
| Platform | Where to go | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Google Workspace | Gmail settings → Approved senders (check Require sender authentication) | Conditional rule |
| Google Workspace | Admin console → Apps → Gmail → Spam, Phishing, and Malware → add informedk12.com to a bypass list | Domain allow list |
| Google Workspace | Gmail settings → Email allowlist | IP-based allow list (accepts IPs only, not domains) |
| Microsoft 365 | Exchange admin center → Mail flow → Rules | Conditional rule |
| Microsoft 365 | Microsoft Defender portal → Threat policies → Tenant Allow/Block List | Domain allow list |
| Microsoft 365 | Same portal → Anti-spam policies → Allow domains | Domain allow list |
Note: Menu names can change over time; check your current admin console if these don't match exactly. If you use a security gateway, look for a similar safe sender setting there.
Technical Reference
Share this with your IT team as needed:
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| Domain to allow list | @informedk12.com |
| Sending address | forms@informedk12.com |
| Dedicated IP address | 204.220.179.224 |
| Email platform | Mailgun |
| SPF / DKIM | Both passing |
| DMARC policy | Quarantine (active protection) |
Note: We normally send from the IP above, but may occasionally use a backup IP. Allow listing the whole domain avoids any issues this could cause. If you notice a different sending IP, reach out to your Customer Success contact rather than assuming something's wrong.
How We Keep Email Secure in Transit
Informed K12 sends email through Mailgun, which encrypts messages using TLS so they can't be read if intercepted. Our system tries to use this encryption on every email it sends.
Note: Encryption only works if both sides support it. If your mail server doesn't support current TLS standards, that protection won't apply, even though we're set up correctly on our end.
Recommended action: Ask your IT team to confirm your mail server supports TLS 1.2 or higher.
Frequently Asked Questions
Our checks all pass, so why is mail still going to spam?
Some spam filters apply extra rules on top of these checks. Adding us to your safe sender list can help even when everything else looks fine.
Do we need to allow list if the checks already pass?
Not strictly, but many districts do it anyway as an extra safeguard.
How do I check our current settings?
Your IT team can check this, or you can use a free tool like MXToolbox (mxtoolbox.com).
Who do I contact with questions?
Reach out to your Informed K12 Customer Success contact.