The Importance of Keeping Fax Communications Secure

Fax remains a legally accepted and operationally essential communication channel across healthcare, government, finance, insurance, manufacturing and logistics, yet most organizations are running it on aging infrastructure that was never designed to meet modern compliance requirements or integrate with cloud ERP environments. LRS and ETHERFAX have partnered to change that, combining LRS’s MFPsecure/Scan device-resident embedded client with ETHERFAX’s patented hybrid-cloud fax network to deliver secure, cloud-based fax directly from the multifunction printer without disrupting established workflows.

A Compliance and Cost Problem That Has Compounded for Years

The case for modernizing enterprise fax has never been stronger or more urgent. More than 70% of hospitals still rely on fax to transmit patient records, referrals and insurance documentation, and fax accounts for roughly 70% of all communication in medical settings, rising to 90% when EHR-linked faxing is included.

The regulatory stakes are equally high: In 2026, healthcare and financial services organizations are expected to manage fax platforms with the same governance applied to every other system that stores or transmits regulated data, including role-based access controls, individual authentication and immutable audit logs.

Traditional on-premises fax infrastructure cannot meet those expectations cost-effectively. Fax servers, analog phone lines, fax boards, maintenance contracts and specialized IT labor represent a capital-intensive operating model that creates compliance risk every time a patch cycle is skipped or a carrier disruption goes undetected. The LRS and ETHERFAX integration eliminates that infrastructure layer entirely.

ETHERFAX operates a global Secure Exchange Network that encrypts data in transit and at rest, provides detailed audit trails and delivery confirmations, and maintains HIPAA, SOC 2 Type II, HITRUST CSF and PCI DSS compliance, with a FedRAMP High-certified GovCloud network for federal agencies. Industry research cited by ETHERFAX indicates cloud fax solutions reduce fax-related costs by up to 80% while improving processing speed by 50%

What Changes for Technology Leaders Managing SAP and ERP Environments

For SAP and ERP technology executives, the LRS and ETHERFAX integration addresses a specific operational gap. As SAP moves to the cloud under RISE with SAP and S/4HANA Cloud, document workflows that previously relied on proximity between applications and devices now traverse public or hybrid network paths.

Without a certified, cloud-native fax solution embedded in the output management layer, those transmissions carry encryption and authentication gaps that contradict the zero trust postures organizations are building across the rest of their SAP environments.

The combined solution connects directly to LRS’s broader output management platform, which an international survey of LRS customers found reduced required print servers by 97%, delivered a five-year ROI of 486% and generated average savings of $1.6 million with a payback period of under 12 months.

LRS MFPsecure/Scan supports all major MFP manufacturers, meaning organizations can standardize fax security across mixed-vendor device fleets without forcing hardware refresh cycles. When both sender and recipient operate on the ETHERFAX Secure Exchange Network, documents are delivered as high-resolution, full-color files in seconds, with no additional client software required at the device.

When evaluating fax modernization platforms for SAP-centric environments, technology leaders should prioritize HIPAA and SOC 2 Type II certification, single-workflow scan-to-fax functionality that reduces user friction, support for mixed-vendor device fleets, ERP integration via API and a vendor track record in regulated industries where fax failures are not minor inconveniences but operational and compliance events.

What This Means for SAPinsiders

Fax modernization is now a cloud ERP compliance requirement. As SAP moves document workflows to the cloud, unencrypted legacy fax infrastructure creates regulatory exposure that transformation leaders must resolve before go-live, not after.

Single-tenant fax security architecture aligns with SAP zero trust requirements. Organizations adopting RISE with SAP must extend encryption, authentication and audit controls to every output channel, including fax, to maintain coherent compliance posture across the entire document lifecycle.

Unified scan-to-fax workflows reduce ERP integration complexity and cost. Embedding certified cloud fax inside existing MFP output management platforms gives SAP architects a lower-risk, faster-to-value path than deploying and maintaining separate scanning and faxing applications across distributed device fleets.