Yesterday we deployed our new web servers, which are powering the Runbox web app at https://runbox.com. There are a few changes and improvements that were deployed at the same time, and that we would like to tell you about.
New login screen
Among other things you may have noticed that the login procedure has changed. This is related to the roll-out of our new Account Security features, which include Two-Factor Authentication. We will post more about this soon, but the important thing to note is that the new login regime is more secure than before. This also completes our transition to a new, global authentication system which we have described previously.
If you have problems logging in
If you are experiencing problems logging in, please make sure that your browser has the latest version of the login screen. You can do this by pressing Ctrl + F5 on Windows and Cmd + R on macOS. If this doesn’t help, please try to clear your browser’s cache and restart it. If this doesn’t help or if you are unsure how to accomplish this, please contact Runbox Support.
There are a few other wrinkles on the new web servers that we are currently ironing out, and besides a more powerful and reliable webmail service we have also deployed a new spam filter.
New spam filter in beta
The new spam filter is powered by Cloudmark, which is one of the strongest authorities on spam analysis in the world. You can try out the new spam filter by going to Manager > Filter and selecting “Cloudmark (beta)” under “Detect junk mail”. If you are already using Dspam (the trainable spam filter) you can select “Both” to activate Cloudmark and Dspam.
The Cloudmark spam filter will automatically catch more spam by comparing spam signatures (fingerprints) with the central Cloudmark database. If you click “Not spam” or “Report spam” to correct spam filter behavior in the webmail, a report will be sent encrypted to the central Cloudmark service. Select “Train using reduced email details” to only send a message signature instead of the full message when reporting misclassified messages.
The Runbox Aero webmail theme
And if you haven’t already done so, we recommend that you try out the Runbox Aero webmail theme, which you can find in Webmail > Preferences. This theme has a more modern design and includes larger and more legible fonts.
More new features to come!
Finally, with the new web servers we have also established a streamlined deployment system that makes the path from development to production much more efficient. We won’t bore you with details, but we can say that you can expect more exciting features from Runbox going forward.
Thanks for the work on this, bringing 2FA in is a big deal so good work on that.
On thing that concerns me:
> Select “Train using reduced email details” to only send a message signature instead of the full message when reporting misclassified messages.
Are you saying that without this option selected the full text of emails marked spam or not spam are sent to Cloudmark?
As in the full body text too?
If that’s the case I strongly request that the default be set to ‘no’ to send just the signature and a clear warning that changing from ‘no’ will result in this behaviour is listed in the Manager > Filter page.
Also, it would be great to get some updated docs on this, I can’t see anything documenting Cloudmark in your help docs and the note on this behaviour is only contained in this blog post as far as I can see. If you have some docs on it, please could you link to it.
Finally, is this new service going to have an impact on your Privacy Policy? Particularly if full text of the email body is being sent to a third party service.
I appreciate there’s a lot of question there and some might not have an immediate answer but addressing them at some point would be appreciated.
TRAINING VIA IMAP
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Does Cloudmark allow training via IMAP? I was just told that training the Dspam filter is now possible via IMAP, will Cloudmark be? If using the ‘both’ option will Dspam still train if messages are sent to spam over IMAP?
I appreciate there are even more questions there and I could ask over the support channel but there’s not much detail on the implementation of Cloudmark that I can see so a public response that would benefit everyone would be much appreciated.
Thanks!
Josh: Thanks for your comments — we agree with your suggestions and will make better documentation and any appropriate policy statements available shortly. In the meantime we will mark the Cloudmark option more clearly as beta functionality and better explain how it works.
Signed up for 2FA with OTP option. Copied the list of 40 codes. Now, no email service.
My Mail program is unable to connect to the account Runbox. So, I can neither send nor receive any email. (Thus, the reason for my posting this here, because even though I contacted Support, how can I get a reply?) Also, I’m unable to sign logon to my account. After entering my email address and password the 2FA screen appears. I enter one of the codes from the lest of 40 and it’s not accepted. Made several attempts with this, each time using a different code from the list with the same results.
At this point, no email service and it’s unclear to me how it can be rectified. Any help would greatly be appreciated. Thank you, Al
Al: Sorry to hear that you are locked out of your account. In order to reopen it we need to verify the account ownership.
Please register a support account at https://support.runbox.com so that we can communicate via the web interface there.
Thank you.
Hmmm, the comments about sending full-text email bodies to Cloudmark servers is a really good point! Not much helpful info is provided at the Cloudmark website about where their data centres are located. I look forward to seeing the updated Privacy Policy from Runbox on this item.
Another question — is Runbox using Cloudmark’s “Authority” feature or “Authority for SpamAssassin”? These appear to be two separate options from Cloudmark. Please kindly clarify this.
Our current implementation of Cloudmark is as a SpamAssassin plugin, but it’s the same engine powering both options.
Regarding the new aero webmail theme, will it be possible to configure for smaller fonts and/or less distance between lines in the email list?
To adjust the font size, please use the A- and A+ functions at the bottom left of the webmail.
I much prefer a green theme, will you be offering a green version of the aero theme?
Given that I use a desktop screen, it is a bit annoying that the “mark as X” functionality has been hidden behind a dropdown. I have enough horizontal screen estate to have the buttons readily available.
Did something change with the default theme in the last 24 hours? Font size seems to have suddenly increased, and when I reduce it (using A-) the line spacing is off.
George – It’s not just you. This change was the reason that I tried out the new Aero theme.