Lavabit shut down

lcafiero · 2013-08-08 19:48:57

I don't know how many of you use Lavabit for e-mail -- I do (or used to until today) -- but apparently they've shut down operations for the moment.

Here's what the home page says: http://lavabit.com/

Unfortunate.

Digit · 2013-08-08 21:14:23

yeah, just saw this myself.

ouch. i bet rise-up will be getting a few more applications now. er... they dont have physical ties over there do they?

My Fellow Users,
I have been forced to make a difficult decision: to become complicit in crimes against the American people or walk away from nearly ten years of hard work by shutting down Lavabit. After significant soul searching, I have decided to suspend operations. I wish that I could legally share with you the events that led to my decision. I cannot. I feel you deserve to know what’s going on--the first amendment is supposed to guarantee me the freedom to speak out in situations like this. Unfortunately, Congress has passed laws that say otherwise. As things currently stand, I cannot share my experiences over the last six weeks, even though I have twice made the appropriate requests.
What’s going to happen now? We’ve already started preparing the paperwork needed to continue to fight for the Constitution in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals. A favorable decision would allow me resurrect Lavabit as an American company.
This experience has taught me one very important lesson: without congressional action or a strong judicial precedent, I would _strongly_ recommend against anyone trusting their private data to a company with physical ties to the United States.
Sincerely,
Ladar Levison
Owner and Operator, Lavabit LLC
Defending the constitution is expensive! Help us by donating to the Lavabit Legal Defense Fund here.

Eren · 2013-08-08 23:26:47

It's a great thing to see a man like Ladar Levison. He gave us hope with his powerful stand for privacy. But I'm *#&$, I'm really *#&$. I have to access my account and get a key from an e-mail asap, but I can't for now. *#&$ *#&$ *#&$ *#&$ *#&$ *#&$ *#&$ *#&$ *#&$ *#&$ *#&$ *#&$

antiv0rtex · 2013-08-08 23:27:18

What an awful situation.

I've had an account with Lavabit for a while now. They seemed like one of the best free providers, by far (aside from the IP-logging thing, which I've complained about here in the past). Here's hoping they can be resurrected someday.

vlax · 2013-08-09 02:32:23

lcafiero wrote:

Unfortunate.

indeed

annoyingbeggar · 2013-08-09 02:50:59

Digit wrote:

yeah, just saw this myself.
ouch. i bet rise-up will be getting a few more applications now.

I really hope that people do not apply to riseup without actually agreeing with the social contract and contributing to the funding. It is a fantastic service for those who do provides a vital need in that regard.

HMW · 2013-08-09 06:21:11

I also just discovered this. I guess I am lucky as I switched to Opera's mail a while ago, but I did enjoy Lavabit for as long as it worked.

Yikes, where's all this gonna end?

oupsemma · 2013-08-09 09:58:37

^ Be aware that operamail.com, as well as Opera mail, which is fastmail.com, have their servers in the US now.

whois wrote:

Operamail.com | Operamail IP Lookup (IP: 66.111.4.55) Hostname: operamail.com
IP Address: 66.111.4.55
Host of this IP: www.fastmail.fm
Organization: The New York Internet Company
ISP: The New York Internet Company
City: New York
Country: United States
State: New York
Postal Code: 10038
Timezone: America/New_York
Local Time: 09.08.2013 05:44:05

whois wrote:

Fastmail.com | Fastmail IP Lookup (IP: 208.71.195.106) Hostname: fastmail.com
IP Address: 208.71.195.106
Organization: Monster Worldwide
ISP: Monster Worldwide
City: Maynard
Country: United States
State: Massachusetts
Postal Code: 01754
Timezone: America/New_York
Local Time: 09.08.2013 05:48:36

And other secure email providers are closing too:
http://silentcircle.wordpress.com/2013/ … customers/
http://www.emaildiscussions.com/forumdisplay.php?f=6

schemer · 2013-08-09 10:11:11

It is quite unfortunate to see today my favorite email service get shutdown.

I have just used it to forward email to my gmail and registration email (login) for many services. Though, I have all the email that got to sent to it, I now face trouble if one of those services refuse to recognize me without my email. Now, with the email shutdown, I can't use forgot password links for all those services and it could prove tough to change the email in most cases without them alternatively letting me login with a username. Still, if I can't remember my password, those accounts are gone.

My plight is orders of magnitude smaller compared to those individuals and businesses who used it as official email and pro accounts. I heard some people just got themselves years worth of the service.

But, for me at the least, it all feels trivial since privacy > email.

(am I/are we on a list now?)

silince · 2013-08-09 10:31:25

Yeah lavabit was my main email provider. This morning I funded this:

http://www.mailpile.is/

As well as changing all my logins etc....

Unia · 2013-08-09 10:40:58

Perhaps this can be a replacement for some of you: https://www.kolabsys.com/news/no-foreig … m-launched

I haven't looked into this, but someone posted this as being an alternative to Lavabit on Dutch website Tweakers.net.

EDIT: I just noticed this is a paid service...

Last edited by Unia (2013-08-09 10:42:34)

gutterslob · 2013-08-09 15:28:53

Yeah, sucks.

Right now I'm taking a "F*ck this sh*t" approach, meaning I'm not going to even bother looking for a replacement. Will just wait and see if Lavabit ever comes back to life. If they don't, then screw it. Thank goodness I didn't have anything too critical on that account (I have a paid corporate-class one with my ISP for important stuff), but I do feel for people who relied on it for matters of more importance.

Might even set up my own mail server one of these days, depending on mood.

mynis01 · 2013-08-09 16:25:53

I have had to call a ton of people and actually speak to them using my voice today in order to get my new email address to all my employment related contacts!

OK100 · 2013-08-09 17:12:20

OpenMailBox seems nice: https://www.openmailbox.org/

Anaconda · 2013-08-09 17:52:43

mynis01 wrote:

I have had to call a ton of people and actually speak to them using my voice today....

That is soooo pre internet!

But yeah, it sucks seeing a good service go down for these kind of reasons and the gag orders make me question what kind of world we are living in these days.

jmad2011 · 2013-08-09 17:57:45

OK100 wrote:

OpenMailBox seems nice: https://www.openmailbox.org/

i signed up for an account to see what its like very nice layout for their web interface pop3/imap was easy to setup and upon sign-up they only asked for my first name/desired username/password/password confim/ agree to terms/ captcha

plus they only use free software are debian based and provid list of the software they use plus server stats and/or realtime server load graphs such as bandwith/mem usage/cpu useage

KrunchTime · 2013-08-10 01:35:45

Here's more info:

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/201308 … sion.shtml

antiv0rtex · 2013-08-10 02:58:42

oupsemma wrote:

^ Be aware that operamail.com, as well as Opera mail, which is fastmail.com, have their servers in the US now.
whois wrote:
Operamail.com | Operamail IP Lookup (IP: 66.111.4.55) Hostname: operamail.com
IP Address: 66.111.4.55
Host of this IP: www.fastmail.fm
Organization: The New York Internet Company
ISP: The New York Internet Company
City: New York
Country: United States
State: New York
Postal Code: 10038
Timezone: America/New_York
Local Time: 09.08.2013 05:44:05
whois wrote:
Fastmail.com | Fastmail IP Lookup (IP: 208.71.195.106) Hostname: fastmail.com
IP Address: 208.71.195.106
Organization: Monster Worldwide
ISP: Monster Worldwide
City: Maynard
Country: United States
State: Massachusetts
Postal Code: 01754
Timezone: America/New_York
Local Time: 09.08.2013 05:48:36

Great. I just purchased a years' Personal Enhanced plan with Fastmail, thinking they were located in Norway. There goes that $40

antiv0rtex · 2013-08-10 03:01:48

gutterslob wrote:

Might even set up my own mail server one of these days, depending on mood.

I hope to do this someday as well. Just need to find an ISP that doesn't block the required ports.

farinet · 2013-08-10 05:33:34

As

Ladar Levison wrote:

I would _strongly_ recommend against anyone trusting their private data to a company with physical ties to the United States.

But, for american and canadian (since for what i know they're treated equally to Us citizen for what concerns "home security") it is difficult since it would be difficult to claim for their rights in a - public - process (against eventual infractions of civil rights by providers and/or authorities; as you think of England it'sabsolutely *NOT* better than Us. And as for the de facto situation also Germany or France, i presume - even though in Germany and France the legal situation is different, at least you would have the right to claim in a public tribunal and process).

Personally, i'd trust most in that iceland based service mentioned above. In the past Iceland as a society gave prove (precisely, in the financial crisis) to to not be blackmailed easily.

Last edited by farinet (2013-08-10 05:34:53)

oupsemma · 2013-08-10 09:48:59

Regarding Germany, things are moving: GMX, T-Mobile and Web.de users will be able to send each others totally encrypted emails
(within Germany)

From 01.net

Found that on a French site ( http://www.lemonde.fr/technologies/arti … 51865.html ), nothing in English yet

Last edited by oupsemma (2013-08-10 09:50:46)

g33zr · 2013-08-11 13:57:00

I don't want to sound like a spoilsport, but you might want to look a little closer at how secure gmx, Telekom, and web.de are in terms of PRISM, etc. That said, is anything really secure these days.

pvsage · 2013-08-11 14:30:40

^ But does a UK citizen like oupsemma have to worry so much about PRISM if he avoids traffic on US servers? (I suppose the fact that so many of us #! users are US citizens makes the #! forums within the NSA's jurisdicktion though. )

g33zr · 2013-08-11 16:01:38

^ Yup. See: http://rt.com/news/spy-agency-telecoms-access-966/

pvsage · 2013-08-11 16:04:08

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#1 2013-08-08 19:48:57

Lavabit shut down

#2 2013-08-08 21:14:23

Re: Lavabit shut down

#3 2013-08-08 23:26:47

Re: Lavabit shut down

#4 2013-08-08 23:27:18

Re: Lavabit shut down

#5 2013-08-09 02:32:23

Re: Lavabit shut down

#6 2013-08-09 02:50:59

Re: Lavabit shut down

#7 2013-08-09 06:21:11

Re: Lavabit shut down

#8 2013-08-09 09:58:37

Re: Lavabit shut down

#9 2013-08-09 10:11:11

Re: Lavabit shut down

#10 2013-08-09 10:31:25

Re: Lavabit shut down

#11 2013-08-09 10:40:58

Re: Lavabit shut down

#12 2013-08-09 15:28:53

Re: Lavabit shut down

#13 2013-08-09 16:25:53

Re: Lavabit shut down

#14 2013-08-09 17:12:20

Re: Lavabit shut down

#15 2013-08-09 17:52:43

Re: Lavabit shut down

#16 2013-08-09 17:57:45

Re: Lavabit shut down

#17 2013-08-10 01:35:45

Re: Lavabit shut down

#18 2013-08-10 02:58:42

Re: Lavabit shut down

#19 2013-08-10 03:01:48

Re: Lavabit shut down

#20 2013-08-10 05:33:34

Re: Lavabit shut down

#21 2013-08-10 09:48:59

Re: Lavabit shut down

#22 2013-08-11 13:57:00

Re: Lavabit shut down

#23 2013-08-11 14:30:40

Re: Lavabit shut down

#24 2013-08-11 16:01:38

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#25 2013-08-11 16:04:08

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