New Privacy Products Available

May 7, 2014 Geir 10 Comments

Runbox prioritizes security, reliability, and privacy above all else. As you probably know, Runbox’ email servers are hosted in Norway, and Runbox Solutions operates under Norwegian legislation which protects our customers’ data.

Our services are protected by Extended Validation SSL with Perfect Forward Secrecy, ensuring encrypted communications between client and server. We enforce a strong Privacy Policy and we do not share any account details or user data with any third party.

To complement our security and privacy features we are now launching the following products:

No Backup

Store your email and files on a separate, dedicated disk volume without backup. This means that when you delete an email it is immediately and permanently removed from our servers.

Domain Registration in Norway

You can register any top-level domain (TLD) name with a Norwegian registrar via Runbox and operating under Norwegian jurisdiction.

By registering a domain name ending with for instance .no, .cc, or .co, your domain’s records are kept in Norway and in the country corresponding with the TLD of your choice.

Domain Management

Runbox can register a domain name for your exclusive use. Runbox Solution’s company name, address, and contact information will be used and we will be the legal registrant. Your personal or business details will not be associated with the domain name, but you will be reserved the right to use it exclusively.

Warning About Insecure Email Apps

May 2, 2014 Dave 2 Comments

We have become aware of at least one email app (application software) available for smartphones and tablets that undermines the security of email sent using your Runbox account.

The email app is very easy to set up with only your email address and password, and you can get it working within a few minutes at most. It was due to this ease of set-up that we became suspicious. There is always a push towards making things easier for users of technology, but we believe that this is one step too far.

We discovered that the email app was not sending email through the Runbox mail servers. There was no SSL encryption between the email client and the servers, and no onwards encryption to a destination that we know normally uses encryption when sent via our servers. Instead of using our servers in Norway, the app used a mail server in another European country!

If this wasn’t bad enough, there was no user notification that the app hadn’t used the correct servers and was instead using an alternative server.

We won’t mention this particular app by name here as that wouldn’t be fair, especially when there may be others that do the same. We do not recommend this type of email app for phones, tablets or computers in general, and we cannot be held responsible for the delivery of email not sent through our servers, but apparently coming from your Runbox email address.

We would urge all Runbox customers to consider the following:

If you are not asked to enter the secure server settings as detailed on our settings page, then you are not in control of how your email is received or sent.

If you have any further questions about this, or would like further advice, please contact Runbox Support.

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U.S. judge rules search warrants extend to U.S. companies’ overseas email accounts

April 29, 2014 Geir 14 Comments

A U.S. federal judge has ruled that U.S. Internet Service Providers must hand over customer emails and other content sought by U.S. government search warrants, even when the data is stored overseas.

The ruling addressed a search warrant against Microsoft Inc. for one of its customers whose email is stored on a server in Ireland.

As a Norwegian company and email service operating under Norwegian jurisdiction, Runbox is not affected by this ruling.

Runbox will not disclose account information or email data to authorities unless presented with a Norwegian court order.

Find out more about Runbox’ privacy policies and Norwegian privacy regulations.

Read the full story at Reuters.

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New IMAP servers deployed with Perfect Forward Secrecy

April 11, 2014 Geir 5 Comments

Our new IMAP servers were successfully deployed today after upgrading the new ZFS based storage, which resolved an error that had previously caused problems. The technical details of this error can be found in the official bug report from the operating system distributor.

The combination of new, powerful IMAP servers and a modern, ZFS based SAN (Storage Area Network) should significantly improve IMAP performance in the coming days and weeks as we move email accounts to the new storage unit.

Perfect Forward Secrecy support for IMAP

Additionally, the new IMAP servers support Perfect Forward Secrecy on SSL (encrypted) connections, which prevents an unlikely eavesdropper to decrypt the communication between client and server.

You do not have to change anything in your email client to enjoy these new technologies, but do let us know if you experience any problems.

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Runbox mentioned in The New York Times

February 19, 2014 Geir 14 Comments

In an article in The New York Times discussing the challenges E.U. leaders face in protecting individuals’ data, Runbox is mentioned along with Deutsche Telekom as examples of companies providing services that increasingly protect their customers’ privacy.

Being firmly located in Norway, the Runbox email service is governed by strict privacy regulations and is a safe alternative to American email services as well as cloud-based services that move data across borders and jurisdictions.

Read the full article here: E.U. Leaders Seek Way to Protect Individuals’ Data

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Phishing scam alert

February 10, 2014 Liz Leave a comment

The following fraudulent email was sent to several runbox users today:

From: “Runbox Team” <runbox@nullrunbox.com>
Subject: This Important message is for you!!!

This is most likely a phishing scam trying to obtain logins, so please delete it immediately and DO NOT click on any links in the message. If you have already responded to this email in any way, please change your password immediately, from the main Account page in the webmail.

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New feature: Tag management

January 26, 2014 Geir 4 Comments

Many of our customers use message tags as an alternative to folders in order to organize and categorize their email.

You can now manage your message tags by clicking Tags in the left pane in Webmail, or by going directly to https://runbox.com/mail/tags. The Tag management screen lets you add and delete tags, and get an overview of the messages that are already tagged.

To add a tag to a message, just open the message, select the tag name (or [New tag] to enter a new tag name) and click “Add tag”.

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Max sub-accounts now available

January 15, 2014 Geir Leave a comment

By popular request we have added a new level of sub-accounts with similar quotas to the main Max account.

The Max Sub-account is now available for purchase from our Payment Options page and includes:

15 GB email storage space
2 GB file storage space
10 GB email bandwidth per week
5000 outgoing messages per day
50 email aliases

Please see our Price Plans for details on all our products.

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Thank you for your support in 2013!

December 28, 2013 Geir 8 Comments

2013 was the year online privacy really came to the forefront of people’s consciousness, after the surveillance revelations especially in the US and the UK. This had a significant impact on Runbox, whose location in Norway made it the service of choice for many people who were concerned about email privacy.

This in turn increased our focus on privacy and security, and over the past 6 months we have taken steps to improve the security of our services further.

We are now investing heavily in new hardware and are deploying privacy features such as support for PGP encryption in order to push Runbox to the forefront of email security and privacy globally.

So thank you for supporting Runbox in 2013 — let’s make next year even better!

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