Hacker News Reader

Comment by berryg | Hacker News Reader

Protonmail looks interesting. They do not store keys. They can only handover encrypted data. It is open source software. - https://protonmail.com/blog/switzerland/

View on HN

> They do not store keys

They say they do not store keys.

> They can only handover encrypted data.

Nonsense. They could using additional installed software[1] or even their upstream ISPs could netflow/tcpdump the SMTP traffic. If the data is unencrypted coming in the door, you should assume it is always unencrypted.

I would not advise anyone to use these kinds of solutions -- they cannot offer any actual security guarantees and it is akin to walking around with a bullseye on your chest.

[1]: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-yahoo-nsa-exclusive-idUSKC...

> They could using additional installed software[1] or even their upstream ISPs could netflow/tcpdump the SMTP traffic.

From memory, netflow is only the connection info (eg source/dest/byte count), and doesn't include any of the transferred data itself. Unless you were meaning straight tcpdump which could grab payload data.

Email is commonly sent over TLS too, which I think (though it's been a while) can be configured as mandatory on servers. eg not accepting unencrypted email

That doesn't mean this is what's happening here, I'm just pointing out it can be done. :)

> Email is commonly sent over TLS too, which I think (though it's been a while) can be configured as mandatory on servers. eg not accepting unencrypted email

However the thing that decrypts the TLS jacket isn't the user's key.

Might as well not be there for some threat models.

It's a proprietary service, though. Sending an encrypted e-mail to someone outside of Protonmail results in them getting a link to a https url to read the message.

I get that it's a legitimate POV that PGP has been proven to be unworkable (although I still don't see why a well-designed client integration wouldn't work). But e-mail is a wonderful, open ecosystem and it's already fighting against the onslaught of proprietary services like FB messenger, slack, iMessage etc. – all of which restrict access to it to approved clients if they allow them at all.

Slight nitpick, slack allows XMPP and IRC clients to connect if you get your admin to flip a switch. They can't obviously guarantee the security of arbitrary clients and so they have it turned off by default.

Email is a great and open system though. Horrible in many ways, but also wonderful.

Thanks for nitpicking.

And yes, email has all sorts of problems, although I'd argue that since the spam problem has essentially been solved none of those actually impact the end user anymore. I'd only wish that it were easier/possible to securely run your own mail server.

On the web side of things, it also appears as if we've gotten to a point where it's easy for the vendors (Google/Apple/MS) to innovate without threatening openness. I'd wish we'd be in the same situation for messaging/mail.

> since the spam problem has essentially been solved

Tell that to the Indian recruiters who flood my mailbox.

For their web client, the encryption is really only useful as long as you can guarantee that the JavaScript code has not been tampered with. Once a court orders them to hand over the private key of their TLS certificates (as has happened in the Lavabit case), it's game over for anyone able to man-in-the-middle the connection to Protonmail, or for anyone who's able to compromise their web server directly. It really isn't any better than Lavabit if exposed to that threat model.

The only added defense they have here is jurisdiction. It would be unconstitutional for a court in Switzerland to order them to hand over their private key, wouldn't it?

> Protonmail looks interesting

Yes, but beware, does not support local (encrypted) backups. If their servers disappear for whatever reason (DDOS, legal issues, hardware problems,...) you end up with 0 e-mails. Nothing.

And yet Proton mail doesn't seem to offer 2FA? That seem like a fail. How can you sell yourself as a "secure service" without that.

They do actually

https://protonmail.com/support/knowledge-base/two-factor-aut...

Ah OK, I stand corrected, thanks. This must be recent then. They did not have this 4 or 5 months ago when I looked and I remember being quite surprised by this. I was told it was a feature that was on the roadmap. Why is this not listed on security details for the product I wonder?

https://protonmail.com/security-details

It was indeed only added a month or so ago.

What is 2FA & who told you 2FA is any useful? Master passphrase -> local key, there's no place for "2FA" buzzword in this scheme.

First of all encryption which is what a master passphrase gives you is not the same as authentication. These are two different concerns.

Second, how well does that master passphrase plus local local key work for you when you are not on your laptop or when possibly using an untrusted computer?

Are you just trolling? Two factor authentication is not buzzword.

hash(encryptionKey) is authentication key. Untrusted computer is a joke threat model, nobody uses them anymore. I'm not trolling.

Weird. I get a timeout for that domain (everything else is fine), but only on my LTE connection. No issue on my fibre line.

DNS probably didn't propagate yet.

i just went through several paid email providers over the last few days and was astonished to see how few allow wildcard mailboxes on custom domains.

protonmail is one of the worst in that regard with only 5 aliases on a regular subscription.

I use FastMail, they handle custom domains excellently.

Agree. FastMail does email very well.

If by 'regular' subscription you mean the cheapest yes it is limited to 5, but you have the possibility to increase it by 5 by paying additional +0,75EUR/month, up to 50.

MxRoute worked for me, I bought in Black Friday.

And it is pretty user friendly too

Reply on news.ycombinator.com