New Runbox Help Website

We are pleased to announce that Runbox now has a new help website at help.runbox.com.

While we wanted a new format so that information was clearer and easier to find, we also recognized that some of the information on the old help website needed updating.  With the new website, we have done both at the same time!

We have highlighted some of the main areas that Runbox members are likely to need at the top of the page: How-tos, FAQ, and Documentation.

Lower down you will find facilities to search the help website, and also select topics from the tag cloud and category list.

How-tos

On the new Help site you will see we have a new section called How-tos. These are articles on how to set up services or software to work with Runbox, like how to set up the Thunderbird email client, or how to change the MX settings with a domain host so that you could use your own domain with your Runbox account.

We will continue to add to these as we are sure there are other things that would be useful. If you think of any, let us know!

Frequently Asked Questions

We have updated the Frequently Asked Questions, and put them in a section that is easier to find and navigate.  If you think there are additional questions and answers that should be in there that aren’t, please let us know.

Documentation

On the new Help site you will see we have brought across all the usual Documentation and also updated it.  We still have work to do on graphics for some areas, and will be producing some updated and new video guides explaining how to use certain features.

How to find what you’re looking for

Finally, a word about Search and Categories/Tags. You can now find what you are looking for by using the Tag Cloud, or the list of categories (Site map) on the right-hand side. Clicking on a tag or category will take you to an alphabetical list of pages that are related to that topic.

Search will of course look for keywords in documents, and attempt to list them in order of relevance.

We hope that you find the new help website useful, and we would be pleased to hear from you about ways in which we could improve it.

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Email Privacy, Security and Runbox

In recent weeks (for some reason) we have seen an increase in demand for information about whether Runbox collaborates with any government law enforcement agencies when it comes to the email sent and received by our members.  We have also had numerous enquiries asking what we do to ensure the privacy of email sent and received by Runbox members.

It seems like a good time to review what Runbox does and doesn’t do.

Monitoring by Law Enforcement & Security Agencies

Runbox is not involved in any routine exchange of members’ data with anyone.

All email data is stored in a secure facility in Norway and access to the data center is very strictly controlled.

Casual requests for information about Runbox members and their email are categorically rejected.  More formal requests are always directed to the Norwegian court system.  Only if a valid Norwegian court order is received, and the proper procedures have been followed, will the request be considered. At that point it will be referred to our legal representatives.

We adhere to our own strict Terms of Service as well as Norwegian laws and regulations, and if we become aware of activity that is contrary to those we will take appropriate action.

Details of laws and regulations as they apply to Runbox can be found on our Email Privacy and Offshore Email page.

Email Privacy and Security

In recent weeks certain claims have been made that email can be intercepted by government agencies as it crosses international borders. Regardless of any truth or otherwise in these claims, the security of email transfer is essential.

It is important to distinguish between three points of security.

  1. Security of the connection between you and the Runbox email service.
  2. Security of the connection used between the Runbox email service and other email services.
  3. Securing the content of your email in addition to 1 and 2 above.

In the case of the first point Runbox provides the facility for email to be encrypted during transmission to and from our members. All that the member needs to do is use our server secure.runbox.com with the appropriate settings.

On the second point, we employ encryption techniques when sending to and receiving from other email services. However, this is only available if the other service also offers this facility.  If it doesn’t then we have to use an unsecured connection.

The third point is entirely under user control.  If a message’s content is encrypted before sending or receiving through Runbox, then whether it is transmitted securely or not is much less important because only the sender and recipient will be able to decrypt the message and read it.

Runbox is planning to provide a method of allowing members to encrypt and decrypt messages using PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) within the Runbox Webmail.

The best way to encrypt messages with your Runbox account today is to use the Thunderbird email client with the Enigmail Open PGP add-on.

For more information about email security see our page on Secure Transfer of Email.

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New function: Save recipients in Contacts

In Webmail > Compose (Runbox 6 only) you now have the option to save the recipients of a message in Contacts.

This option is found next to the Send button, and if checked, it will add any recipients to Contacts that aren’t already listed there. The new contacts will be saved in a separate Group called “Auto-saved” to make it easier to find them in Contacts.

The next time you compose a message, the saved recipients will show up in the Groups and Contacts list to the right. They will also appear as suggested matches when you start typing in the recipient fields.

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Runbox, email privacy, and the recent news

In the last few days we have seen an increase in inquiries about privacy and security, and particularly whether Runbox could be involved in programs similar to those outlined in the recent allegations about interception of communications data by law enforcement agencies.

As a Norwegian company and service, Runbox is protected by Norwegian law and privacy regulations because all our email servers are located in a secure facility in Oslo, Norway. No entity, domestic or foreign, can access email or files stored in our data center without a Norwegian court order.

You can read more about US, European, and Norwegian privacy regulations here: Email Privacy and Offshore Email

Email encryption

To protect data being transferred to and from the Runbox servers in Norway, it’s important to use encryption such as SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) which is available both in the Runbox Webmail and in email clients.

When using Webmail, make sure that the SSL padlock icon is visible in the browser’s address bar and that the domain’s identity is verified as runbox.com.

In email clients such as Outlook and Thunderbird, set up your Runbox account with SSL according to the instructions found on our IMAP help page.

Runbox plans to extend our encryption support in the near future to allow complete encryption of messages all the way from sender to recipient.

 

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Unlimited Aliases – Using Domain Catch All with Filters

Aliases

From time to time we get asked by members if we could allow unlimited aliases on domains as part of our standard plans that have email hosting included. We understand that if you own a domain you want to use it in a way that suits your needs.

You can of course purchase additional aliases for your account and use them with your domain.  However, this comes at additional cost, and there is another way that you can effectively create aliases for free.

Using Catch All

In Account > Email Hosting you will see a list of your domains (if you have any) and next to each one is the option to allow that domain to “catch all” email that is sent to it.  The benefit of selecting catch all for a domain is that all email sent to anything@nulldomainyouown.com will be delivered to your account.

Pros:

  • you don’t need to set up aliases you can just make up anything@nulldomainyouown.com and use it immediately
  • emails where people mistype the alias will still be delivered (as long as they spell the domain correctly of course)
  • effectively unlimited aliases

Cons:

  • it could increase the amount of spam you receive because all email is delivered and spammers may try to guess aliases

As you can see, the pros outweigh the cons, and there is even something you can do about the spam issue (see below).

Using Filters with Catch All

When using catch all, emails can still be filtered just as with any alias that is set up.  With the careful use of filters a lot of flexibility can be achieved.  If you look at the screen-shot below, you will see a number of filters are being used for different purposes. An explanation of each filter follows the screen-shot.

alias_filters


In the case of each filter the “Header” option is used because the use of “To” would not match emails where someone sends to your address/alias in the CC or BCC fields.

Filter 1:  Filters emails sent to alias1@nulldomainyouown.com and moves them to the Inbox.

Filter 2:  Filters emails sent to alias2@nulldomainyouown.com and moves them to a folder called Personal.

Filter 3:  Redirects emails sent to alias3@nulldomainyouown.com to any other email address you want, and does not leave a copy of the email in your Inbox.

Filter 4:  When you use your own domain with Runbox, by default we always allow email to postmaster@nulldomainyouown.com to get to your Inbox unless you decide to filter them. This is good email practice and this is common across email providers. You will require something like Filter 4 if you decide to implement Filter 5.

Filter 5:  This is where we can do some spam control. This filter deletes all email addressed to your domain that doesn’t match one of the filters that comes before it.  Filters are matched in order, so this one has to come last. If a spammer tries to guess at an address at your domain, this filter will prevent those emails reaching your Inbox.  However, it does not reject them, and people who might mistype your alias will also have their emails deleted with no rejection email to warn them that the email was not  delivered.

A Note about Filter Orders

As mentioned earlier, filters are used in the order they are listed. In the example above the ordering is deliberate even though the order of the first 4 does not matter too much in this case. Filter 5 has to come last otherwise it would delete all email to your domain before the others could filter it.

The order 1-4 that we have used in our example places the filters after our spam filters.  This might be desirable.  However, if you were using a filter to redirect email to another email address, you might want all email to that address including possible spam to be sent to the other address so that filtering can happen in the destination account.

To do this you need to place any filters before filter value -2 (minus 2) as this is where the Runbox spam filters are. You can see a list of filter order values in the Runbox discussion form under Order Values for Filter Processing.

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Email Alias and Email Domain limits increased

After a lot of customer feedback we’ve decided to increase the number of email aliases and email hosting domains included in all Runbox subscription plans.

Both main and sub-account subscriptions as well as legacy subscriptions and the 3-year Medium plan will be upgraded.

The following upgrades will take effect June 1, 2013 for all existing and future Runbox accounts:

Email Aliases

Plan Micro Mini Medium Max
Previously 5 10 20 50
Now 10 20 50 100

Email Hosting Domains

Plan Micro Mini Medium Max
Previously 0 1 2 5
Now 0 5 10 25

You can find a complete overview of our price plans here: http://www.runbox.com/price-plans/

We will continue evaluating our plans and appreciate your feedback!

What about my existing alias/domain add-on products?

If you have any existing email alias or email domain upgrades they will be added to the new quotas. For instance, if you have a Runbox Medium subscription with a package of 5 extra aliases, you now have 55 email alias slots available.

We have deactivated any automatically recurring alias/domain add-ons in case they aren’t needed with the new quotas. You will be alerted to renew them manually when they expire, at which point you can decide whether or not to keep them.

What are aliases anyway, and how do I use them?

An email alias is simply an alternative email address pointing to your Runbox account. By using several addresses you can better organize your email because it lets you manage several “identities” from within the same account.

You can read more about aliases in our recent blog post How To Use Email Like a Pro 3: Use Several Addresses or go straight to Account > Aliases in your Runbox account to set them up.

What are email hosting domains?

An email hosting domain lets your Runbox account receive email sent to addresses @domainyouown.com. Note that this is not the same as an actual domain name, which needs to be registered in the global Domain Name System (DNS) first.

In order to manage your domain’s email in your Runbox account you first need to register your domain in Account > Domain Hosting (or another domain registrar) and set the domain’s MX (Mail eXchanger) record to point to mx.runbox.com. Then you can add your domain in Account > Email Hosting to tell the Runbox system that your account shall receive email sent to your domain.

Finally you can set up email aliases or even other accounts on your domain, using Account > Aliases and Account > Sub-Accounts.

Find out more about Email Hosting and Domain Hosting.

Using Catch All for unlimited aliases on your own domain.

If you own your own domain, it is possible to use the “catch all” function in Runbox Mail Manager as a way to have unlimited email aliases on that domain. You can even use filters to forward emails to other accounts within Runbox, or to other email providers.

To activate this feature go to Account > Email Hosting and select the catch all check box next to the domains you want activate catch all for, and then click “Save Settings”.

All emails addressed to anything@nulldomainyouown.com will then be delivered to your account.

We have another blog post about using catch all alongside filters to provide aliases for various uses, and how to control spam that using the catch all function might attract.

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New POP server being added

We’re planning to deploy an extra POP server Monday May 27 at 6-7 AM CET to improve performance for POP email clients.

This deployment should not affect services negatively, but please let us know if you do experience any irregularities using POP during or after the specified time.

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How To Use Email Like a Pro 3: Use Several Addresses

Using just one email address can make your email communication disorganized because everything ends up in the same folder by default. It can also make you more vulnerable to spam — if your one address is picked up by so-called spambots there isn’t much you can do about it.

Having more than one email address provides great flexibility because you can associate them with the various aspects of your life such as work, school, personal, shopping, etc.

Not only will your email be much easier to organize, but you can use one of the alternative addresses for various online services — some of which might share your address with third parties with or without your consent, thereby attracting spam to your account.

Email Aliases

With Runbox you can easily set up multiple email aliases that point to your account. An email alias is simply an alternative to your main email address, and email sent to it will arrive in your account just as if it had been sent to your main address.

You can associate aliases with different email folders in your account by using filters to sort incoming email based on the recipient (alias) address.

This way you can manage several identities or profiles and gain more control over your email. Find out more about aliases or go straight to Account: Aliases in the main menu in your Runbox account to get started.

Disposable Email Addresses


Runbox even lets you use disposable addresses by adding + and a string of letters and numbers between your username and the @ sign. For instance, if your username is zorro, you can already receive email sent to zorro+whatever@nullrunbox.com.

This means that you can enter for instance zorro+idontwantspam@nullrunbox.com as your email address in a contact form at some online service, and your account will receive email sent to that address just as if it had been sent to your regular address.

Filtering Your Email

You can now filter messages sent to your alias or disposable address to a separate folder, thereby protecting your more important addresses and keeping spam away from your Inbox.

For even more fine-grained filtering, you can include the name of the service you’re leaving your dispaosable email address with, and filter email from each service to separate folders.

To find out more about email filters, see the Filter help page.

Using Catch All for unlimited aliases on your own domain.

If you own your own domain, it is possible to use the “catch all” function in Runbox Mail Manager as a way to have unlimited email aliases on that domain. You can even use filters to forward emails to other accounts within Runbox, or to other email providers.

To activate this feature go to Account > Email Hosting and select the catch all check box next to the domains you want activate catch all for, and then click “Save Settings”.

All emails addressed to anything@nulldomainyouown.com will be delivered to your account.

N.B.: Using the catch all function can attract more spam, but it is possible to control this (see below).

We will soon write another blog post about using catch all alongside filters to provide aliases for various uses, and how to control spam that using the catch all function might attract.

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Countering the recent spam surge

Over the past 8-10 days we have seen a significant surge in incoming spam, especially about weight loss.

We are working to reject more of this type of spam centrally, and hope to have achieved this as of today.

But if your account is still severely affected, there are things you can do to improve the situation meanwhile:

Most of our customers report that their spam filter does catch the spam, but that going through the Spam folder looking for legitimate messages becomes too big a task due to the large number of spam messages.

If this is affecting you, please see the following article on how to set up an extra filter to separate the very obvious spam from the messages the spam filter is less certain about and that you should review manually: https://help.runbox.com/avoid-sorting-through-spam-for-legitimate-email/

If your spam filter doesn’t catch this type of spam, please make sure that your Trainable Spam Filter is enabled in Manager:Filter, and that you train any missed spam mails using the Report Spam button.

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How To Use Email Like a Pro 2: Use a Smartphone

In today’s world of constant communication, being able to pick up your email on the go lets you stay in touch with your workplace, family, and friends regardless of where you are.

Stay connected, stay efficient

Not only does this let you stay connected in case an important message is sent to you while you’re on the road, but perhaps equally important: You can spend idle time, for instance at an airport or on a train, to stay ahead of your email communication and avoid getting a backlog which you’ll have to process once you get to a computer.

Using a Smartphone with IMAP

With a Smartphone, for instance an Apple iPhone, checking your Runbox email on the go becomes a pure pleasure. If you set up your phone to use Runbox via IMAP, you will stay completely synchronized with the server and any other computers that are configured in the same way. You can find detailed instructions on how to set up Runbox on an iPhone in our Help section.

Be aware of disruptions

Since you can connect to Runbox in a multitude of ways and from virtually any location anywhere in the world, it’s important to be aware of how to manage your communication as efficiently as possible. For instance, it can be helpful to check email regularly and at certain times to avoid it disrupting work and life too much. More on this in later posts!

 

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