- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
- tech@links.roobre.es
- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
- tech@links.roobre.es
Email is an open system, right? Anyone can send a message to anyone… unless they are on Gmail! School Interviews uses two email servers t…
Anyone know a decent alternative at a reasonable price though? What if I have an @gmail today, and I want to move my storage elsewhere and have that just forward?
I switched to ProtonMail and have really enjoyed it. I was using my own domain with Gmail so my email address didn’t even change.
For those considering Proton Mail: There is one great benefit or disadvantage, depending on how you see it. As all traffic is encrypted, Proton Mail does not support standard IMAP or POP3. It’s therefore best used with the official Proton Mail app rather than third party apps. On desktop, you can use your favourite email client (Thunderbird et al) only if you install a “bridge” which decrypts incoming emails before forwarding them to the client: this bridge is, in turn, only available to paying subscribers.
That said, it’s a great service, and the fact that they have a viable business model which doesn’t depend on selling out their users might be a good thing.
IMAP supports TLS, what’s Proton’s excuse for enforcing their own delivery protocol?
Proton is end-to-end encrypted - they don’t have the keys themselves. With TLS, encryption is between you and the server, but the information can be decrypted on the server side.
At least that’s my understanding of it. If you want Proton’s own words, they wrote an explanation on their website. :)
They’re not using a different protocol for delivery, they still use IMAP and SMTP, but other mail clients can’t decrypt the message content from Proton because they don’t have the keys (and nor do Proton). Proton do supply a “bridge” app if you want to use your Proton mail with a desktop email client, which handles the decryption between your computer and Proton by accessing the Proton encryption keys on your computer.
TLS is like a padlock on a box, and you have the key. Encrypted content is if the letter in the box is also written in code, needing another key to translate into plain language.
Any advice or hints on how to switch over? I wanted to do it years ago but I dread having to change my main mail address on everything, from apps, tools and games to bills or RL document-related stuff, it sounds like a horrible mess and ton of work
My recommendation (assuming you have a normal @gmail addy and not a custom domain like I had) would be to use email forwarding. So you can leave your Gmail as is, but set it up (in the settings) to automatically forward all your email to your new protonmail address. Then you can gradually change the important contacts/sites to your new email at your leisure.
I do highly recommend buying a domain and setting up your own email address though, it gives you a lot more portability going forward. You can actually do a lot with your own domain, and it helps you maintain trust better.
Anyway, enough preaching lol, protonmail also maintains a guide to help people switch: https://proton.me/easyswitch
If you’re recommending setting up a forward/IMAP collection from a Gmail account, don’t forget to mention deleting the messages from the server as well! Emails left on a server for more than 30 days are considered “abandoned property” for the purposes of warrantless search.
What an insane fact, I had no idea thanks for sharing 😱
Do you have a source for this?
The most I could find is that the Electronic Communications Privacy Act allows for warrants to be issued for emails less than 180 days old. I’ve found vague references and snippets from articles no longer available that seem to claim some acts that have passed since then allow for simple subpoenas instead of full on warrants for said emails, but 180 days is the only threshold I’ve found and again, it’s for less than 180 days that’s at danger.
Does protonmail support custom domain email addresses?
They do, I have used them myself for years and have no complaints!
If you are setting up a forward/IMAP collection from Gmail though, be sure to set it to delete messages from Gmail after forwarding/collection. Any email you leave on a server longer than 30 days is classified “abandoned property” for the purposes of warrantless searches in the US (and if you’re European using Gmail, this applies to you too), even if you’re still actively accessing the email inbox.
My recommendation for everyone is to use Fastmail and a custom domain.
Fastmail is extremely reliable, and since they charge money they also offer customer support. A few years ago I lost a lot of emails due to a client bug, and Fastmail support was very helpful recovering them from backup.
Use a custom domain so you can change providers in the future so you’re not locked into your provider and can change if you aren’t happy with them anymore.
I’m also using fastmail and I’m happy with them. Their native android email client is a little clunky but I still use it and I have the option to use other mail clients too.
Can you elaborate on the use of custom domain? The idea of not being locked in to one provider is fantastic!
You purchase your own domain through a provider like Porkbun or Namecheap, something like clover333.com
Then you pay for a service like Fastmail (you need at least the Standard plan for custom domains). And you setup Fastmail to use your custom domain as the address. There are various ways to handle this, but if you just do the simple approach and use Fastmail as the nameserver it’s pretty straightforward.
Go to Namecheap (or similar) and buy a domain, then your email provider will give you two things to paste into their settings, and then shortly after that your custom domain will be online. It’s very easy.
Why use a custom domain? your email is the base of your digital identity and online security, owning your email is a huge improvement in security.
If you ever want to change email providers you can easily import your mail to any provider and you don’t have to update any websites or setup forwarding. You can also setup unlimited catch all emails.
The main example I point to is if you get banned from Google and use gmail then you lose access to all your accounts. Google has no customer service so you’re cooked if that happens. Or if you use your email through your ISP then you can never switch and they can charge you higher prices knowing this.
It isn’t all sunshine and rainbows, it’s more expensive, not all email providers allow custom domains and they may charge more for them, and you still need a secondary backup email in case you ever lose access to your domain.
There’s also the threat of someone scooping your domain, so buy it for a very long period with auto renewal enabled, transfer lock on, and WHOIS protection on. The threat is low but even Google has forgotten to renew their domains.
Personally, I think it’s worth paying for.
I use posteo.de which is a german provider. It costs 1€ per month. Did not have any problem with them and I’ve been using them for years by this point
I feel like step 1 is just buying a domain so you can have control over your e-mail address, and then you can switch providers whenever you want (or host it yourself).
If you already pay for extra iCloud storage you can use a custom domain for e-mail with iCloud… Many people are already paying for this, and if not it’s only $1/mo. Apple’s still a pretty big e-mail provider, so maybe that doesn’t address all of your concerns, but it’s a really cheap way to use a custom domain that more people should take advantage of imo.
I host my own e-mail and it’s pretty care free these days (I don’t send bulk e-mails, though, so I don’t contend with rate limits at all). Honestly, more people should do it instead of buying into all of the fearmongering about e-mail… It’s a little tricky to set up right, but the impossibleness of the situation is somewhat exaggerated. The best defense for self-hosted e-mail is if more people actually do it… Otherwise you’re just capitulating to the large (and slightly less large) mail providers.
+1 on having your own domain. I was using gmail for a long time, and recently switched to my hosting provider’s included-with-purchase email. Having my own domain made the move transparent to everyone, and relatively painless.
I’m a Proton Mail customer. It’s them or Fast Mail in my opinion
I don’t know if this fits your needs, but check out setting up a mailinabox instance.
Startmail
Proton or Tutanota are both encrypted free alternatives. I like proton better personally
Zoho is a good choice in my opinion. They offer everything google offers productivity-suite-wise, and it’s pretty cheap.
allow me to second proton mail. First they’re in the EU, so fall under their privacy protection rules. Secondly, the service is technically an encrypted email service. They operate on a fremium basis, letting you have basic email for free, but also,if you upgrade, you can do lots of things (like they’ll manage your email server if you happen to have a domain)
Others have mentioned ProtonMail but there is also mailbox.org which is cheaper.
I don’t know what it is, but there is just something about ProtonMail that seems… off… to me.
Buy a custom domainname ($10-30 a year, do not use godaddy) and get a paid mail provider ($3-5 a month). Other commenters posted a few good ones. I like soverin.net
You could check out Tutanota, fastmail and mailbox.org. They aren’t that expensive and from what I’ve heard all work pretty well. Protonmail is another option, but is a bit more expensive. If you opt for an annual or semi-annual subscription the difference isn’t huge compared to the other ones I mentioned.
migadu.com works really well for me. I also have been using namecheap’s email service without any issue whatsoever.