Hi everyone! Since I was absolutely fucked by Skiff (thank fuck I didn’t pay for it) I’m looking for a new email provider :) I’m not sure I like how proton is transforming into a full on suit, I only need email. Any other recommendations or is proton my only choice really?
Regardless of who you choose. Use an aliasing service. It makes moving to a new provider/email address a breeze on the future. It took me days to go around updating all my 200 sites online. If I ever move from proton it will take me 5 minutes to ensure all my sites now go to my new provider.
My only tip would be to create a new domain rather than using a shared one. This will prevent some sites from blocking you from using an alias.
Email alias indeed helps to avoid spam and helps you to assume separate identity per site, but won’t help in any way to stop mail provider/server from processing your email data for user profiling / targeted ad purpose.
Buying email domain and self-hosting is only the full proof way from privacy POV, but it is really difficult target to accomplish. A privacy respecting email hosting + alias should be next ideal choice, IMO.
Self hosting is best if you have the knowhow, inclination and time to maintain it, but there are alias services that will encrypt any mail they forward using a key you provided so this would eliminate the ability of your chosen non-self-hosted email provider/server to easily read your received mail limiting their ability to profile or target to any metadata and header info that is passed along unencrypted.
Of course, then you are placing trust in the alias service’s privacy and logging policies. But some are open source and you could host an alias forwarding service yourself if you wished as well.
Check out YUNOhost. It’s an open source operating system for servers which comes with email already set up. You can install it on a cheap VPS or home server and easily manage it graphically via web portal.
Been using Tuta for a few years and its great. Can use catch-all with my own Domain
I found http://mxroute.com/ they offer sane prices for unlimited emails and domains. I’m in the middle of switching to them.
Tuta, I’ve had an account with them for years. Since the end of 2023 Proton Mail dropped off my list because of its funding for Bellingcat.
https://propagandainfocus.com/proton-mail-imperialist-stooge/
Proton, known for its privacy-centric email service Proton Mail, announced at the end of 2023 that it would help raise money for controversial group Bellingcat, a documented proxy British intelligence operation, through its annual Lifetime Account Charity Fundraiser.
Damn wtf
I’m happy with fastmail. Remember that must people you email are probably on Google (Gmail) so there is only so much you can accomplish in terms of email privacy whatever you do.
Posteo, mailbox.org, Tuta.
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https://mailbox.org/en/ (can have your own custom domain)
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https://tuta.com/ (can have your own custom domain but like Proton you cannot use K9-mail app and similar)
Run your own, you need a server, tech knowledge and time, or maybe Tuta mail?
Another vote here for Fastmail. I also like Posteo, Mailbox and mxroute, but these are not as fully featured - which may be perfect for you if you’re after email only. What I really like about Fastmail is that on top of being a customer-focused business (rather than a customer is the product business), they offer a really snappy web interface with excellent search - and they are extremely compliant with email standards, building everything on JMAP.
I do not like Proton or Tutanota. I have used both, including using Proton as my main email account for the past two years. I do believe they are probably the best when it comes to encryption and privacy standards, but for me it’s at far too much cost. Encrypted email is almost pointless - the moment you email someone who isn’t using a Proton (or PGP encryption), then the encryption is lost. Or even if they just forward an email to someone outside your chain. I would argue that if you need to send a message to someone with enough sensitivity to require this level of encryption, email is the wrong choice of protocol.
For all that Proton offer, it results in broken email standard compliance, awful search capability and reliance on bridge software or being limited to their WebUI and apps. And it’s a shame, because I really like the company and their mission.
Don’t even need proton for that, just use delta chat.
https://github.com/privacyguides/privacyguides.org/blob/HEAD/docs/email.md and https://www.privacytools.io/privacy-email document services you’ll probably find interesting.
There isn’t. Self hosting is the only way you can send email without giving your data. All email provider have your data, assuming there is a provider that is private is lying yourself. Even if they have some kilograms of privacy policy.
I 💜 Protonmail. I generally like proton as a company.This video has really gained my trust for them as a privacy focussed services provider.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
My 2 ¢: Email is inherently not private. With tls you have encryption in transit, but as soon as the data hits the server no metadata is ever encrypted. With pgp you can encrypt the message content, sure, but not with many of the advanced features we expect from e.g. Signal and matrix. Therefore it doesn’t really matter if you use proton ot tuta, unless you exclusively mail other proton/tuta users.
I am extremely happy with purelymail.com. extremely cheap and versatile. I also use mailfence.com but that’s only because i’d like to have two different servers for something as important as mail. Been a customer with purely for probably 3+ years . Mailfence probably 6+ years. Have seen two small outages with mailfence. None with purely.
I’m curious what’s the advanced feature?
I am no expert, so this is just my understanding: pgp encrypts the message, with the the recipients public key. Once the private key is compromised , bruforced or cracked, all messages are compromised. With signal, and all the other apps that uses signal protocol, it’s different. Here, the key is renewed often (i think for each message) and the key is device dependant. Therefore if the key is compromised no previous messages are compromised and neither are communications with other people. This is what e2e means, and pgp is not that. Also the key or self is harder to crack I think, but i am not sure how strong signals elliptic curve crypto is finished to a 4096 rsa key.
Tldr: pgp is a simple encryption at rest, that can be cracked once and for all. Signal et. All is e2e encrypted and much harder to compromise one and for all.
Have been happy with Tuta
ProtonMail is good for professional and personal usage. It is stable, it is reliable, will not shutdown, paid tiers subsidise free tier successfully and is treated safe like Gmail/Outlook by email providers. Just not good for activist usage (check Moon of Alabama blog), but 99% of email providers are bad for that.
If you don’t need anonymity you could just buy a domain with a single email and use your own email app SMTP. I think it’s cheaper than most email providers.
