Imagine sending emails on a service that is as secure as a Blockchain?
Lavabit, the well-known email encryption service which was forced to shut down is looking for a comeback as Dark Mail. Dark Mail is an ongoing project undertaken by The Dark Mail Alliance, which is a collaboration between Lavabit and Silent Circle.
Founded in the year 2004 by Texas based Ladar Levison, Lavabit provided secure email services to over 410,000 people for almost a decade before the United States federal authorities forced him to take the decision of shutting down the service instead of sharing user information and emails of all its account holders with the government. According to Ladar Levison, Lavabit was created to address the security and privacy concern’s associated with email service providers like Google’s Gmail where the company indexes words in email content to display relevant advertisements and use the data for their marketing purposes.
Lavabit which was relatively unknown until 2013, shot into fame after it was revealed that the NSA whistle-blower Edward Snowden was using the service to communicate with lawyers and contracts. Following the incident, Lavabit was served with a search warrant demanding SSL keys of the platform and a long list of subpoenas and court attendance.
Lavabit and Secure Circle, a secure communication service provider known for its Blackphone (a secure smart phone) are working on Dark internet Mail Environment (DIME) which works on a mail protocol derived from the conventional SMTP.
Dark Mail Alliance has been raising funds to further develop Dark Mail. In an earlier Kickstarter campaign they had successfully raised over 212,000 USD from close to 3000 backers. Dark Mail initiative also has a Bitcoin wallet for those who would wish to donate Bitcoin.
Even though Dark Mail is not based on Blockchain technology, it does share a few qualities. However, there are people who are already working on it and we can expect Blockchain based secure email services coming soon in the coming months.
