[tor-talk] Email provider for privacy-minded folk

[NoName]

On 12.02.2013 01:47, bvvq wrote:
>   * Privacy-conscious (don't parse my emails to target advertisements to
> users)

Email was not born in an era when privacy was any concern. In a way, 
privacy was using the email as only few knew how to use it. That means 
plain text connections. That means a lot of data is tracked, including 
the entry point and the traject of the email. The errors disclose a lot 
of private data. And the whole thing is passed around in plain text. 
Given that, not only your provider, but any server passed along the way, 
can parse emails for any imaginable purpose, not just target 
advertising. As a rule of the thumb, when I read one service that 
promises a lot I just move to the next as they are liars.

Beware that the US has the nasty habit of recording and analysing any 
email passing through their space. So an Italian server sending mail to 
a Dutch server, if it ever passes through an US server than is parsed 
and stored for an indefinite period of time.

Privacy should be by design and not by policy anyway.

>   * Reasonable storage space (I have currently have 418 emails using
> ~100MB in my personal GMail account)

I don't know any server that would give less than 1G and will not 
upgrade if asked nicely or for a few USD. So you'd be safe.

>   * Don't close the account if I don't log in with the web interface in
> {X} days

Take a look at wikipedia in your own language. There is a webmail server 
comparison or something like that. In that table you will find the days 
before automatic closing of the account. If paid, usually is the last 
pay day, unless they have a free plan.

>   * IMAP preferred but POP will suffice

Some give IMAP4. Some give POP3. Sourceforge has a couple of small apps 
that can convert any other webmail into a POP3 source. SMTP would be the 
thing to look for. And the SMTP restrictions too.

>   * Free would be nice (I don't want to lose my email account if I lose
> my job)

I think email is the cheapest service you can get online by far. The 
problem for some of the tor users is associating a credit card with an 
account. Otherwise, the most expensive personal accounts are still below 
20 USD a year. For someone in an Indian village would be a 6-month pay. 
For someone in the industrialised world is one, two cheap meals at most.

Cheers!