Proton Mail is great and their basic service is free! I upgraded to their cheapest plan, which gives me the ability to create about 8 email addresses in Proton domain names (i.e. name1@pm.me) AND to have my own domain name hosted for email. (I.e. john@secure-email.com ) I obfuscated my real name and paid through a BitCoin wallet not in my name.
A few years ago Proton was served with a search warrant for info on a Proton user. Proton complied by producing no emails, as its all encrypted. However, Proton did provide the IP address of where the user logged in from. This was enough for the police to know who and where to look for the user to arrest him. Thus, another “weak link in the chain” of security is your IP address, which gives clues as to your physical address. This can be masked with a VPN. A good topic for William to write on * hint *
Another weak link is the operating system you are running your E2E email on. Is MS-Windows, ChromeBook, Apple recording your keystrokes? That’s why I use open-sourced Linux. (Another topic hint 😊 )
On a related topic, how about your non-secure email? I use Fastmail to host my regular email. It’s similar to Gmail except it’s (somewhat) private I like the convenience of IMAP email so I can access it from my GrapheneOS phone, an internet browser or my client-side email program – I use open-sourced ThunderBird. (With privacy, there is always a trade-off between security and convenience. With Fastmail, I pay for their product. With Google, I am their product!
One’s email address is becoming increasingly important to one’s identity. If Gmail de-platforms you or your email provider goes bankrupt or you get a better deal elsewhere, you can change email providers easily.
Great read with great explanations as always William. I love what you are doing at Privacy Society and I can’t wait to get my hands on my new phone!
Love it William. I thought I knew a lot about encrypted email and you just taught me multiple things I didn't know in a matter of minutes!
Thanks, love what you are doing @Privacy Society!
The biggest issue is people think just by using an encrypted email provider all their emails to everyone is protected. Thanks for reading.
Proton Mail is great and their basic service is free! I upgraded to their cheapest plan, which gives me the ability to create about 8 email addresses in Proton domain names (i.e. name1@pm.me) AND to have my own domain name hosted for email. (I.e. john@secure-email.com ) I obfuscated my real name and paid through a BitCoin wallet not in my name.
A few years ago Proton was served with a search warrant for info on a Proton user. Proton complied by producing no emails, as its all encrypted. However, Proton did provide the IP address of where the user logged in from. This was enough for the police to know who and where to look for the user to arrest him. Thus, another “weak link in the chain” of security is your IP address, which gives clues as to your physical address. This can be masked with a VPN. A good topic for William to write on * hint *
Another weak link is the operating system you are running your E2E email on. Is MS-Windows, ChromeBook, Apple recording your keystrokes? That’s why I use open-sourced Linux. (Another topic hint 😊 )
On a related topic, how about your non-secure email? I use Fastmail to host my regular email. It’s similar to Gmail except it’s (somewhat) private I like the convenience of IMAP email so I can access it from my GrapheneOS phone, an internet browser or my client-side email program – I use open-sourced ThunderBird. (With privacy, there is always a trade-off between security and convenience. With Fastmail, I pay for their product. With Google, I am their product!
One’s email address is becoming increasingly important to one’s identity. If Gmail de-platforms you or your email provider goes bankrupt or you get a better deal elsewhere, you can change email providers easily.