Aberdeen Group released research showing that users of cloud-based email security solutions had substantially better results than users of on-premise email security implementations in security, compliance, reliability and cost. Compared to companies using on premise email security solutions, users of cloud-based email security solutions reported 47 percent fewer incidents of spam and malware, 65 percent fewer audit deficiencies, 50 percent less security-related downtime, and 11 percent lower total cost per end-user per year for email security. In light of the current market hype about cloud-based computing, Aberdeen is highlighting practical examples of cloud-based security services, starting with the number one use case for security software as a service: email security. Cloud-based email security solutions, or hybrid solutions that leverage intelligence from the cloud, can help to ensure that spam and other email threats are eliminated before they touch the enterprise network, reducing risk and moving costs from the "not avoided" to the "avoided" category. For each of the last three years Aberdeen has conducted benchmark studies on best practices in email security and security software as a service, and the use of cloud-based email security solutions showed the biggest increase over the previous year.