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Fastmail offers EU data region

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Re: Fastmail offers EU data region

#91

Post by jacquesm »

DarrenDev wrote: post #87
jacquesm wrote: post #9

EU data regions are a reflexive action by companies that try to hold on to their EU customers (and more and more are leaving, surprisingly the larger ones seem to be leading here). Realize that as long as you are still hosted on US owned infrastructure or that if there are US (or: five-eyes) owned companies anywhere in the stack your data can still be forcibly pulled and often without you being aware that this happen…

EU sovereign clouds are taking off right now - especially when it comes to sensitive data (government, healthcare, etc.). Lots of players moving into the space. The common denominator - nothing touches the US. AWS, Azure, GCP, Oracle, Schwarz Digits, SAP

You can strike at least four of those.

Re: Fastmail offers EU data region

#92

Post by tmgldn »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #20
mrtesthah wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, but Fastmail is an Australian company based in Melbourne.

As a FastMail customer who spends a portion of the year in the US, I am happy to pay to move my data to the EU region, even if they cannot yet fully guarantee all my data will remain outside of US access at this time. Defense and mitigations in depth, over time. We must always start somewhere, and perfect is never the target (as it does not exist).

Agree - small steps always positive here

Re: Fastmail offers EU data region

#93

Post by easton »

DarrenDev wrote: post #87
jacquesm wrote: post #9

EU data regions are a reflexive action by companies that try to hold on to their EU customers (and more and more are leaving, surprisingly the larger ones seem to be leading here). Realize that as long as you are still hosted on US owned infrastructure or that if there are US (or: five-eyes) owned companies anywhere in the stack your data can still be forcibly pulled and often without you being aware that this happen…

EU sovereign clouds are taking off right now - especially when it comes to sensitive data (government, healthcare, etc.). Lots of players moving into the space. The common denominator - nothing touches the US. AWS, Azure, GCP, Oracle, Schwarz Digits, SAP

Requiring that you believe those companies that they won’t hand the keys over to the US at the first ask.

Like, the critical problem with the AWS sovereign pitch is that you must believe that they won’t give the keys to the US, and they also won’t give the source code that’s hosted in the US to the government either for them to find vulnerabilities in. I don’t know if that’s good enough unless you just need the data to stay in the EU and you don’t care if another country sees it.

I know they probably did some work on it (what if primary AWS goes rogue and the EU entity must work without it) but I don’t know if they explained how they’re safe to the public.

Re: Fastmail offers EU data region

#94

Post by preisschild »

petcat wrote: post #61
greenleafone7 wrote: post #56

The article states that they do not offer any guarantee that my data will stay in the EU! I feel that that's the whole point. And the whole point of them making this article/advertisement.

How could they possibly guarantee such a thing? Do you only send and receive emails with people in the EU?

Its not about the people you send emails to, its about who has access to your entire mailbox.

In the moment that would be the Trump Administration for example.

Re: Fastmail offers EU data region

#95

Post by jacquesm »

easton wrote: post #93
DarrenDev wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EU sovereign clouds are taking off right now - especially when it comes to sensitive data (government, healthcare, etc.). Lots of players moving into the space. The common denominator - nothing touches the US. AWS, Azure, GCP, Oracle, Schwarz Digits, SAP

Requiring that you believe those companies that they won’t hand the keys over to the US at the first ask. Like, the critical problem with the AWS sovereign pitch is that you must believe that they won’t give the keys to the US, and they also won’t give the source code that’s hosted in the US to the government either for them to find vulnerabilities in. I don’t know if that’s good enough unless you just need the data…

The harder problem here is that any real EU sovereign platform would have to come with ironclad guarantees that it isn't going to be directly or indirectly sold to a US party. And when enough customers move that marketshare is affected the bags with money tempting shareholders will get larger and larger.

Re: Fastmail offers EU data region

#97

Post by 3eb7988a1663 »

tene80i wrote: post #54
crossroadsguy wrote: post #35

I have never understood their 50+10 GB storage as the starting plan. Anyone storing a lot of emails, please don't come at me screaming, but know that not everyone keeps every email and every attachment ever received right there in that email account (especially the attachments). For me, email is just communication i.e timed information, not data storage, except for very personal emails, and very very rare, some non-p…

You mean why isn’t there a cheaper tier than $5/mo? Not much to be gained by offering it, I would think.

Even at cloud prices, 50GB of storage is ~$1/month. Offering an additional tier with pathetic storage to save $0.80 or whatever is muddling the offering.

I guess they could offer a 0GB storage option that only operated as a relay?

Re: Fastmail offers EU data region

#98

Post by preisschild »

petcat wrote: post #51
vzaliva wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not know any EU-only, but ProtonMail is in Switzerland.

Proton is leaving Switzerland because of surveillance and privacy issues. > Because of legal uncertainty around Swiss government proposals to introduce mass surveillance — proposals that have been outlawed in the EU — Proton is moving most of its physical infrastructure out of Switzerland. https://proton.me/blog/lumo-ai They are moving to Germany, but will quickly find that they are going to face the same surveillanc…

That was 2023 before the 2nd Trump Admin and before the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board that was supposed to be independent and protect against abuse has resigned.

Re: Fastmail offers EU data region

#99

Post by throwawayffffas »

ffsm8 wrote: post #31
jacquesm wrote: post #9

EU data regions are a reflexive action by companies that try to hold on to their EU customers (and more and more are leaving, surprisingly the larger ones seem to be leading here). Realize that as long as you are still hosted on US owned infrastructure or that if there are US (or: five-eyes) owned companies anywhere in the stack your data can still be forcibly pulled and often without you being aware that this happen…

> your data can still be forcibly pulled and often without you being aware that this happened as a german i feel the urge to point out that this technically also applies to european companies... With more hurdles for the US, but still technically applicable

I am almost positive things are not the way they were and requests for data access especially if the subjects background is "suspect" are more highly scrutinized.

And as the Americans are choosing to interfere in European domestic politics and trample their own laws and constitution the more scrutiny their requests will get.

Re: Fastmail offers EU data region

#100

Post by jph00 »

atmosx wrote: post #43
jacquesm wrote: post #9

EU data regions are a reflexive action by companies that try to hold on to their EU customers (and more and more are leaving, surprisingly the larger ones seem to be leading here). Realize that as long as you are still hosted on US owned infrastructure or that if there are US (or: five-eyes) owned companies anywhere in the stack your data can still be forcibly pulled and often without you being aware that this happen…

That’s true and Fastmail runs on AWS. But it’s a start and a “feature” many have requested for years. It’s funny because the HQ and I believe their workforce is located in Australia.

Not only is that not true, but in fact FastMail predates AWS by some years.

Source: I founded FastMail.

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