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ProtonMail now offers elliptic curve cryptography

protonmail.com

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Re: ProtonMail now offers elliptic curve cryptography

#11

Post by Leace »

keiferski wrote: post #4

This gets asked often, but as someone wanting to get away from Gmail, any thoughts on Fastmail vs. ProtonMail?

They represent vastly different philosophies. Fastmail is direct alternative to Gmail with good UI and UX but they're based in Australia and against message encryption as it impacts their UX (for example it's not possible to index encrypted messages). Protonmail is an OpenPGP company (they directly invest in OpenPGP.js) but have issues supporting other standards. For example IMAP/SMTP is available only through a bridge.

Re: ProtonMail now offers elliptic curve cryptography

#12

Post by brobdingnagians »

wil421 wrote: post #2

Anyone using ProtonMail regularly? I created an account but haven’t used it much. How are your experiences? Any iOS users who can comment on their experience with proton mail and the default mail client? I don’t went to switch to something that won’t be around in a decade or so.

I use it as my main email, with a gmail account for throw-away spam, and have the protonmail Android app, I like both the web and android versions quite a bit; could have a few more features, but for everyday usage it is good. No frills but everything normal and easy to use.

Re: ProtonMail now offers elliptic curve cryptography

#13

Post by lvh »

X25519 is great, but it doesn’t make Protonmail (really, OpenPGPjs) a net safe communications mechanism.

It inherits all of the flaws inherent in OpenPGP, including optional authenticators (which lead to EFAIL), kitchen sink bulk protocols complete with negotiation (did you know your public keys specify what algorithms you like?), lack of forward secrecy, repudiability, et cetera.

We should stop using RSA. But RSA isn’t what was keeping OpenPGP from being a great secure communications channel. That’s aside from the question if it’s meaningful to say you control your keys if you use OpenPGPjs served up every time by a third party. (I say that being extremely on the PGP apologia side of the scale compared to some of my peers!)

Re: ProtonMail now offers elliptic curve cryptography

#14

Post by robin_reala »

Leace wrote: post #11
keiferski wrote: post #4

This gets asked often, but as someone wanting to get away from Gmail, any thoughts on Fastmail vs. ProtonMail?

They represent vastly different philosophies. Fastmail is direct alternative to Gmail with good UI and UX but they're based in Australia and against message encryption as it impacts their UX (for example it's not possible to index encrypted messages). Protonmail is an OpenPGP company (they directly invest in OpenPGP.js) but have issues supporting other standards. For example IMAP/SMTP is available only through a brid…

They’re based in Aus, but their servers are in the US (which is why I decided against switching from GMail to them in the end, and picked someone a little more local).

Re: ProtonMail now offers elliptic curve cryptography

#15

Post by [deleted] »

robin_reala wrote: post #14
Leace wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They represent vastly different philosophies. Fastmail is direct alternative to Gmail with good UI and UX but they're based in Australia and against message encryption as it impacts their UX (for example it's not possible to index encrypted messages). Protonmail is an OpenPGP company (they directly invest in OpenPGP.js) but have issues supporting other standards. For example IMAP/SMTP is available only through a brid…

They’re based in Aus, but their servers are in the US (which is why I decided against switching from GMail to them in the end, and picked someone a little more local).

[deleted]

Re: ProtonMail now offers elliptic curve cryptography

#16

Post by throwaway_x13zd »

keiferski wrote: post #4

This gets asked often, but as someone wanting to get away from Gmail, any thoughts on Fastmail vs. ProtonMail?

I use both. Fastmail is more compatible with clients and has a good per-client security model. However it is based in Australia, which has increasingly insane digital privacy laws.

Proton mail has more advanced cryptographic features and my understanding is that your email is encrypted so they can't offer it up to third parties without your consent (or at least stealing your password.) The usability is not as good: search often does not work very well (I believe this is due to the encrypted nature of it) and there are only a handful of local clients you can use via their bridge. The mobile app is pretty good, the web app is acceptable but clunky.

I use fastmail for day to day stuff I don't care too much about and protonmail for my more important/personal stuff. Both support custom domains so you can move your email to another provider if you get sick of one.

Re: ProtonMail now offers elliptic curve cryptography

#17

Post by mikece »

meu5 wrote: post #6
wil421 wrote: post #2

Anyone using ProtonMail regularly? I created an account but haven’t used it much. How are your experiences? Any iOS users who can comment on their experience with proton mail and the default mail client? I don’t went to switch to something that won’t be around in a decade or so.

Switched to FastMail recently as I like to stay productive and didn't want to use Google Calendar.

I adopted a mix of both: FM for non-secure and calendar stuff, ProtonMail.ch for stuff that needs to stay private. I do love FastMail -- just wish their iOS app allowed me to sign into and switch between multiple FM accounts like Gmail does. The lack of this feature is the ONLY reason I'm not Gmail-free yet.

Re: ProtonMail now offers elliptic curve cryptography

#19

Post by drexlspivey »

keiferski wrote: post #4

This gets asked often, but as someone wanting to get away from Gmail, any thoughts on Fastmail vs. ProtonMail?

I've used both for some time and decided to move to Fastmail and so far I am very satisfied.

Fastmail does one thing and does it well, email. There is no PGP support. Protonmail does PGP in the browser via a library that they serve you themselves which I find less than ideal. If you want to do it outside the browser you need to have a subscription and download a bridge software that needs to be running on your machine. With Fastmail if I need PGP in my email I do it via the GPGTools plugin for the Mail app which uses the system gpg installation.

Re: ProtonMail now offers elliptic curve cryptography

#20

Post by ravenstine »

wil421 wrote: post #2

Anyone using ProtonMail regularly? I created an account but haven’t used it much. How are your experiences? Any iOS users who can comment on their experience with proton mail and the default mail client? I don’t went to switch to something that won’t be around in a decade or so.

I love Protonmail! I use it both on desktop and Android. It's interface is very basic, but that's the way I like it. I pay for it as well as ProtonVPN so they will hopefully stay in business.
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