About secure and private email service Mailfence
Who is Mailfence?
Mailfence is a secure and private mail service, that provides an end-to-end encrypted email with digital signing. In this blog, you can learn what is truly unique about Mailfence.
Mailfence is a service operated by ContactOffice Group SA. We are not a traditional startup with a high cash burn rate, but are in it for the long haul. We are cautious, reliable, stable, and honest. Furthermore, we do serious things, but with passion. We launched the company in 1999 and are among the pioneers of cloud software in Europe.
Our vision
We believe that Internet privacy is an absolute and definitive right. Online privacy matters and is just as important as offline privacy. Some people say that the loss of privacy is the price we must pay for security. But giving up our privacy is not nothing, it means giving up the freedoms on which democracy depends. So we decided it was high time to offer a service fully dedicated to email security and privacy.
Few people realize how much information they give up by using the internet. Therefore, many might think that they don’t care about privacy. But they don’t realize just how much personal data is stored for commercial purposes. They also don’t know and cannot control how governments, corporations and others use the information which they willingly put online…
If they did realize, they would probably be much more careful.
We think that what you don’t know CAN hurt you. That’s why internet users’ absolute and irrevocable right to privacy is at the heart of the Mailfence design philosophy.
The Mailfence offering
Email is a great communication technology, but it also makes you and your computers susceptible to viruses, spam, phishing, scams and other online threats. What makes Mailfence stand out from all other email services is that it has been conceived to protect you and your privacy.
Mailfence is a service without advertising or backdoors. It is safely hosted in Belgium and uses a non-US SSL/TLS certificate. We provide end-to-end encryption which makes eavesdropping impossible and renders intercepted data utterly useless.
We also offer digital signing capability for authenticating digital messages and documents. A digital signature tells the recipient that the message was created by a known sender, prevents the sender from denying having sent the message, and validates the integrity of the message. All of which is useful for private individuals or professionals who want to protect themselves from identity forgery or tampering.
Plus, Mailfence offer is GDPR-compliant. This means we are dedicated to protecting your personal data and helping you ensure that your company complies with GDPR email regulations and requirements.
What is unique about Mailfence?
- Mailfence is a complete email suite offering tools such as a Mailfence Calendar, Mailfence Documents, Mailfence Contacts, Mailfence Groups, Mailfence Chat and Mailfence Polls.
- Mailfence is interoperable with any other OpenPGP compatible encrypted email service.
- All encryption operations take place in the browser, making it a “true” end-to-end encrypted email solution.
- Mailfence integrates digital signatures.
- Mailfence gives full control over key management with an integrated keystore.
Mailfence design philosophy
In short, Mailfence has three fundamental privacy characteristics:
1 – Pure end-to-end encryption
End-to-end encryption varies greatly in terms of implementation. At Mailfence we offer the full stack. Mailfence uses OpenPGP. All the encryption/decryption & digital signing occur in the user’s browser. Our servers (along with all the intermediaries) have absolutely zero knowledge of the message content and attachments – making it a pure end-to-end encryption (E2EE) solution.
We offer encryption in its true essence because our users are able to exchange encrypted emails with any other solution that supports OpenPGP. Mailfence does not limit you to use encryption only with other Mailfence user (as opposed to several other secure email solutions that limit secure communication only to users within their platform). As a matter of fact, users can even send unencrypted emails or can only sign their emails and not encrypt them. Therefore, the ball is in your court !
2 – Allow absolute control and freedom to the user
In order to set-up encryption, users have been provided an integrated key-store (a space within the account that can store user key-pairs, other public keys etc). This key-store allows users to perform efficient key-management (generate, import, export, modify, revoke, delete or publish/fetch PGP public keys…) all from within the application environment.
There is absolutely no dependency on any third-party client and users are able to manage their keys – whenever they want, wherever they want and whichever way they want – thereby giving them the ultimate freedom over their E2EE functionality in a single independent platform.
3 – Provide a complete package that is easy to use
This is indeed one of the biggest challenges. Without compromising the true essence of end-to-end encryption, we want to offer a complete package to our users without any dependency on third party services, plugins, etc. We believe we provide something which is not only easy to use but also incorporates all the typical features of a top-notch messaging platform with all email features such as custom domain, contacts, documents, calendars, groups, etc.
Join the fight for online privacy!
We believe online privacy is a right worthy of fighting for and therefore pledge to donate 15% of all revenue of the Ultra plan to the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the European Digital Rights Foundation that fight for the defence of our rights in the digital world.
Do you want to regain your email privacy? Sign up now for a free account and try our secure and private email.
And if you have any request or suggestion to make, please let us know. The needs of our users are at the core of our approach, and Mailfence makes it a priority to offer the best support.
Mailfence is not just a service, but part of a worldwide movement to regain online privacy. Encrypt everything and join the fight for online privacy and digital freedom.
– Mailfence Team
Patrick is the co-founder of Mailfence. He’s been a serial entrepreneur and startup investor since 1994 and launched several pioneering internet companies such as Allmansland, IP Netvertising or Express.be. He is a strong believer and advocate of encryption and privacy. You can follow @pdeschutter on Twitter and LinkedIn.
