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Should you still recommend FastMail as a secure alternative?

Open mariusz opened this issue 5 years ago • 6 comments

In December, Australia passed a law that thwarts strong encryption and possibly forces Australian companies to introduce a government agencies encryption backdoor into their applications. Since FastMail is an Australian company, should it still be recommended as a viable alternative to GMail, then?

mariusz avatar Jan 22 '19 08:01 mariusz

Fastmail always had the ability to decrypt if requested by law. The other two options on the list do encryption on the user side so it probably makes sense to at least be more specific on what the services offer privacy-wise. https://fastmail.blog/2018/12/21/advocating-for-privacy-aabill-australia/

eby avatar Jan 27 '19 15:01 eby

+1

Some standardized details should definitely be included for each external service, to be aware of the details. E.g. For mail this is backdoor potential and legal requirements, VPNs would include IP logging as well.

sebastienvercammen avatar Jan 30 '19 10:01 sebastienvercammen

ProtonMail and Tutanota are Encrypted Alternatives, but if you don't need the encryption than FastMail is probably the best first choice.

jgallias avatar Feb 01 '19 04:02 jgallias

This site seems best for regular people to consume; these kinds of considerations might be better for sites like https://www.privacytools.io/ and https://prism-break.org I'd say split the baby and specify 1:1 alternatives separately from "encrypted" alternatives

jgallias avatar Feb 01 '19 05:02 jgallias

Happy to consider removing FastMail, although I'd just counter that almost every other service listed on Security Checklist has a US presence which means it's vulnerable to Gov backdoors and data requests.

brianlovin avatar Feb 01 '19 18:02 brianlovin

No I think we should leave FastMail and if anything break out ProtonMail and Tutanota into an "Encrypted" section/sub-section. I know of and can see a lot of regular people needing to use and switch between both.

jgallias avatar Feb 03 '19 07:02 jgallias