Protecting Your Emails and Instant Messages
We all use emails and instant messengers daily. However, we should know how to protect these messages from being intercepted or modified, even if the instant messaging or email service is secured via SSL. There are different ways to deliver your messages securely. I will mention the ones I trust, plus additional ways to remain anonymous and combat spam.
Securing your instant messaging on iPhone:
- TNO solid paid secure text chat go for Threema. Excellent free alternative would be Wire which has web, desktop version, and video calls.
- Free secure text chat go for Sicher or MyEnigma or Wickr. Avoid using WhatsApp and Telegram.
- Another free secure text chat based on OTR go for Chatsecure.
- For secure free voice calls go for Signal or Mumble.
- For secure limited free time text and voice chat go for Seecrypt (Friend Synchronization is complicated).
- For secure paid voice chat go for Silent Phone or Silentel.
- To add extra layer of security on text chat you can use Opengp or iPGMail.
Blackphone is a smartphone that comes unlocked and features several pre-installed privacy tools, all fully enabled for at least two years of use.
Securing your emails:
For our company we use Google apps service. Though they are using SSL , TLS and point-to-point secure smtp (gmail to gmail) I wouldn’t trust these methods as they can be intercepted via Manin The Middle Attack MITM attacks.
For secure email service solution that benefits from a security-conscious design and strong cryptography based on open standards S/MIME and OpenPGP. They also store all client data on a physical server bank in Switzerland go for kolabsys. For the community edition of it go for Kolab. Another alternative Swiss Swiss-based end to end encryption, Fully Anonymous is Protonmail.
To have an end to end encryption and secure your emails or files sent through mail clients such as google apps go for PGP here shareware or a free alternative is GPG4Win. For iPhones and iPads use Opengp or iPGMail.
If you would like to integrate PGP with your webmail then go for Mailvelope.
To secure and encrypt Internet connection go for StealthWalker. To be anonymous you need to access the email within the Stealthwalker browser or use Tor Browser.
To encrypt emails at the gateway level go for Djigzo.
To easily encrypt files using a web browser only go for Mini Lock.
Extra email utilities:
Untraceable emails:
First Method (Recommended):
- Connect to any VPN node via StealthWalker and launch the Stealth Walker browser which is based on Tor network.
- Register a new account with Yandex.
- Send your email to the desired destination.
- Never login to the account again using any other browser as the StealthWalker browser will never keep a trace of your online activities.
Second Method:
- Download Tor Bundle and run it.
- Use Yandex or Tor mail to create new account via Tor browser.
- Send you email and close the Tor browser.
You can use both methods to be anonymouse on the web as well these methods will hide your real identify while posting on websites such as forums, blogs, Facebook and Twitter.
Securing your instant messaging on PC:
- For secure text chat with end-to-end encryption that implements perfect forward secrecy go for Cryptocat they also also offer a mobile version now.
- For secure free voice chat go for Mumble.
- For secure voice and video chat use Wire or Jitsi. I would never use Skype chat as it’s not end-to-end encryption find out why here.
As I mentioned earlier you should first secure your connection via VPN tool like StealthWalker.
Services to send self-destructing notes:
- Compose a text-only message on their servers via SSL with IOS and Android support go for Temp.
- Web service using SSL to send secure self-destructing notes and get notified by email go for Privnote.
- Web service using SSL to send secure self-destructing notes with control of number of views and days go for Quickforget.
Resources:
- For full review on secure messaging by EFF please visit this post or this sheet.
- To know more about encryption please read this document.
- To know more about IOS security please read this document.
- To know more about Wire security white paper please read this document.
- To know more about Wire privacy white paper please read this document.
- To know more about Threema security white paper please read this document.
