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which email service do you use?

cavi

cavi

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 19, 2010
151
28
Haifa, Israel
Hello everyone,

I wonder how many from you are using iCloud as main email account. for me, until now, gmail is the main account but since I don't want Google to read all my emails I'm looking for "safer" solution. I tried to run Server app on my Mac mini for several months, but I found server to be unreliable and I don't have confidence with Server. moreover, when I use my home server if there is a problem with the electricity or internet line I have no access to my email box. thus, although I own personal domain name which I will be more then happy to use, I'll use "regular" extension (I thought to buy a "professional" email service from Godaddy, but 5US$ per month is 4US$ more from the amount I'm willing to pay =]).
So, what you think about iCloud? do you have other suggestions which are not "reading" every email and are "safe" to use (with regard to privacy)?

Thanks!
A.
 
I've got domain email accounts hosted by Google Apps and Office 365. They work fine for me.

The issue isn't that Google reads emails...it's that they data mine emails. Emails are read all over the internet. That's how spam is detected.
 
I have a yahoo, gmail, iCloud, and hotmail account for person stuff. Just use the built in mail app for them all, never had problems with it. Use exchange app for work though to keep it seperate and link with OneDrive.
 
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I use fastmail.com with my own domain name.

I have been wanting to transition to iCloud for some time as besides email I am all in the Apple ecosystem, but they neither support custom domain names nor send aliases which hare not iCloud addresses so this is a no go for me.
 
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bob24 said:
I use fastmail.com with my own domain name.

I have been wanting to transition to iCloud for some time as besides email I am all in the Apple ecosystem, but they neither support custom domain names nor send aliases which hare not iCloud addresses so this is a no go for me.
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I would like to do the same. Sadly, iCloud email does not appear to be reliable. I wish Apple would concentrate on their cloud services and make iCloud email great. Until than I use Fastmail.
 
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I've been using fastmail for a few years now, gave up on iCloud email after they mysteriously dropped a few emails related to my home purchase.. no spam folder nothing.. they showed up on my other account just fine. It then happened a while later on an email forwarded to me by my wife.

never again will I trust their email.

Fastmail with IOS actually works better than apples own as it updates the message read icon real time if you read email on another device it gets updated on all.
 
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Gmail. Tried many time to migrate to iCloud, but never was able to fully get on board. I really want it to work and go all in on the Apple services, but I feel like you are giving reliability and features. Those are not two good things to sacrifice for the all in experience. I have thought about Outlook.com because they at least have push notifications with Apple Mail, but have never really tried it out.
 
My concern is that not all 3rd party mail apps may support iCloud. Also, I see no reason to restrict myself to one ecosystem in this sense, as there is no guarantee I will stick with the Apple ecosystem my whole life.
 
I use gmail as well and cox my ISP for stuff I don't care about anymore.

I don't really care so much for emails so I'm not worried if google reads all mine.
 
cavi said:
...I'm looking for "safer" solution.
Click to expand...

Using posteo.de (paid, cheap), tutanota.de (has unpaid and paid options, cheap), protonmail.ch (unpaid and paid options, expensive).

All the three services boast zero knowledge on server side (in Posteo you have to enable disk and calendar encryption manually) and are working according to Swiss (Protonmail) and German (Tutanota and Posteo) laws.

Tutanota and Protonmail require using browser or specialized mobile clients, as they encrypt your disk using separate passwords, Posteo you can use with any IMAP-compatible client because logon password is used for encryption (and they give a warning that once you forget your password it can be changed, but your encrypted data will be lost).
 
Abazigal said:
My concern is that not all 3rd party mail apps may support iCloud. Also, I see no reason to restrict myself to one ecosystem in this sense, as there is no guarantee I will stick with the Apple ecosystem my whole life.
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iCloud email uses standard IMAP (and publishes the necessary server data), so it will work with pretty much every email client on the planet. You won't get efficient push email on non-Apple mobile devices though, since that feature uses an Apple-proprietary mechanism.
 
tf_dc said:
Tutanota and Protonmail require using browser or specialized mobile clients, as they encrypt your disk using separate passwords, Posteo you can use with any IMAP-compatible client because logon password is used for encryption
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That is not entirely true. For what they call "ingress encryption" ("Eingangsverschluesselung") you have to provide an S/MIME public key. They will then encrypt all incoming mails using that key (which only you can decrypt using the matching private key). It is true though that you can use the feature with most common email clients, since S/MIME is widely supported (including by Apple's mail clients on iOS and MacOS).

However, to claim this is "zero knowledge" is a bit misleading, since they can of course intercept and read the incoming emails before encryption, if directed so e.g. by the government. The same is true for Tutanota and Protonmail, unless you happen to communicate with someone on the same service. The only real "zero knowledge" solution is to use some form of end-to-end encryption on the clients.
 
dumastudetto said:
I never get any spam with my iCloud. So it seems to be working pretty well. Gmail on the otherhand gets hundreds of spam emails everyday.
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Yea but in my experience iCloud spam is crap in the other way.

What I mean is they don't put all the spam in the spam folder, they seem to be just deleting it and that is together with a bunch of important email that I never get to see. You can't manage this either.

My experience is a couple years old though since I haven't used iCloud email after that. Who knows it might have improved but my trust is pretty much lost forever.

Currently using FastMail btw with custom domain, works fantastic.
 
I use iCloud as basically my "personal" email. Family, friends, Amazon, my banking, etc. I have my own hosted domain address I use for mailing lists, social media, etc.
 
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