In today’s digital world, privacy and security are more important than ever. As we navigate online communications, it’s important to understand how encryption can safeguard our emails. Let’s explore what encryption is, how it works, and why you want to consider using it.
What is Encryption?
When you send an email without encryption, it’s like sending a private message on a postcard – anyone who handles it can read its contents. At its core, encryption works by converting the readable data of an email into a scrambled format. Basically, the contents of that email turns into gibberish so that nobody can read it. The point is to keep the email private while it’s in transit from you to the recipient.
Even though most email services use some form of encryption for data in transit, this is not the same as end-to-end encryption. With end-to-end encryption, only the sender and the recipient can read the message. This method effectively prevents anyone else, including email providers, from accessing the content of your messages.
While many of us might feel that we have little to hide and aren’t overly concerned about others reading our communications, it’s important to understand how our information could be accessed. Encryption helps to safeguard our personal information, which may contain sensitive details about our personal finances, family matters, or other private information.
The Real Cost of Our Digital Communications is Our Privacy.
You’ve been happily using “free” email for years, and haven’t thought much about it. The problem is that it’s not really free. You become the product, and you pay with your privacy. Let’s dive into what it means.
1. Free is not free
With countless services offering “free” email accounts, it’s easy to assume that we can communicate without any cost. But companies that offer free email typically rely on advertising revenue, which means they collect vast amounts of data about our habits, interests, and communications. They use this information to tailor advertising, and that’s how they make money.
Email aliases are great – they help organize emails, reduce spam and protect our identity. But sometimes we need a quick way to create an alias without having to log in to our account to set it up. That’s when we can use plus-addressing, or subaddressing.
You simply add a + to your email address followed by a tag.
Any email sent to a plus-address is delivered to your account as usual. The message is still addressed to the plus-address, and you can use this in various ways to manage your email.
Plus-addressing benefits
Make up addresses on the fly without having to set anything up in your Runbox account.
Works with any email address, alias or domain.
Use a plus-address to identify sites where you used your email address.
Plus-addresses can help hide your main email address.
Use a different tag for each site so that if one has a data leak you know which one it is.
Filter email to specific folders based on the plus-addressing.
Create a filter to delete email to that particular plus address if it starts receiving spam.
Plus-addressing and email aliases are great tools to manage your email. With a Runbox account you get unlimited plus-addressing and 100 email aliases. If you have your own domain name, you get unlimited aliases. Check out this post for more info about aliases.
You can get more details about plus-addressing here.
To learn about how to create email aliases, check out this blog post.
Do you use email aliases? Aliases are a great tool that can help protect your identity, reduce spam, and organize your inbox.
Aliases are alternative email addresses that you can use to separate emails. Instead of using the same address for everything, you set up different aliases for online subscriptions, registrations, newsletters, social media, business contacts and so on. Any category that works for you. You can use your main address for friends and family, or create another alias.
All your aliases are set up under your main email account, and is delivered to your primary inbox. You can even set up filters so that mail is separated into specific folders in your account.
Not only will aliases give you another layer of anonymity, it also gives you control over your information and makes online tracking more difficult. Having aliases can help prevent someone hacking your main email account, and helps protect you from phishing attacks. If one of your aliases starts to receive lots of spam, you can easily delete the alias and set up a new one.
Oslo District Court has found Grindr’s sharing of personal data illegal as a result of the Norwegian Consumer Council complaint from 2020. Accordingly, Grindr has to pay EUR 5 million, as fined by the Council.
Our guardians of personal data and privacy: NDPA, NPAB, and NCC
As we have written multiple times in our blog series about GDPR and consequences of this EU-regulation, Norway has a long history of protecting citizens’ personal information. It started out with the first Personal Data Act implemented in 1978 with the purpose of protecting the individual against privacy being violated through the processing of personal data. The law was updated with GDPR clauses in the year 2000.
In 1980, the Norwegian Data Protection Authority (NDPA) was established as an independent authority whose task is to monitor compliance with the Personal Data Act. It is important to note that the NDPA has two roles: supervisory authority and ombudsman.
The NDPA decisions may be appealed to NPAB, Norwegian Privacy Appeals Board (Personvernnemda), whose decisions are final.
During recent years, another Norwegian governmental public body, the Norwegian Consumer Council (NCC), whose role is to protect consumers’ interests, has become involved in privacy, more precisely the misuse of personal data that big tech companies are involved in. As a governmental-independent agency, the NCC is free to chose the cases they want to work on.
Sharing of personal data is illegal without specific consent: The Grindr case
Recently, the NCC has put effort into the task of preventing the big tech companies from using personal information for surveillance-based marketing that the users have not consented to. Neither have users given consent to how personal data is transmitted to the companies’ partners.
When we go online or use apps, we are being tracked. Companies collect our personal data by tracking us across the web sites we visit. They build profiles on us based on our browsing history and online behavior. They want to sell us their products and services, and the more they know about us the better they can use this data to manipulate our behavior.
You know those ads that pop up everywhere after you looked up something? After you’ve looked up a new car, car ads follow you around all day. You research a vacation to Alaska, and travel ads show up everywhere. This is the result of targeted advertising, which is based on data they collected on you. Some call it surveillance capitalism, and it’s big business.
Privacy is about how your data is collected, processed, stored and used. It’s about maintaining control over your personal information and your identity. Privacy isn’t about hiding secrets, it’s about keeping your personal information safe from people who can do harm.
Suddenly you are noticing strange things happening with your email. You’re receiving email messages about login attempts, password resets and two-factor authentication codes, and your friends and family are wondering why you’re sending them weird emails. You can’t even log in to your own email account and you’ve been bumped out of your social media accounts. What is going on? Your email might have been hacked.
Don’t panic… but act quickly. You can minimize a lot of damage if you act fast and methodically.
Because your email is a gateway to all your online accounts, like banking, shopping, social media and streaming, it can potentially be a goldmine for a cyber criminal if they gain access. Here’s what you can do.
You may have noticed that you’re getting a lot more spam email lately, which is frustrating and annoying. You diligently go through these emails and add them to your Spam filter, you block the sender, unsubscribe from mailing lists and so on. The spam emails keep coming…
Why it’s happening
When we sign up for web sites we effectively give them permission to use our email. These companies may sell your email address to other companies who will in turn send you spam.
Whenever there is a data breach on a website where you have subscribed to something, email addresses can be repeatedly sold to other spammers. You can check if your email has been been in a breach here: https://haveibeenpwned.com
Spammers use mechanisms that allow their emails to go through the spam filter. They will use valid email addresses such as a @gmail account, create look-alike domains that will look like a legitimate company, or even spoof your own email address because many people whitelist their own address.
Because of AI, spammers and phishers can very quickly create mass campaigns. Previously, spam was often easily spotted because of bad grammar and lack of personalization (goodbye Nigerian prince). Now, spammers use artificial intelligence to make spam and phishing more convincing, and they use social media, online behavior and public information to generate personalized campaigns. The result is that we are bombarded with spam.
The year 2023 was marked by significant environmental and climate-related events that underscored the urgent need for collective global action. From escalating greenhouse gas emissions to unprecedented weather extremes, the planet experienced alarming signs of environmental degradation and climate disruption. This blog delves into the most pressing issues of 2023, accompanied by illustrations and sourced data to shed light on the state of our environment.
Rising Carbon Emissions
Despite global efforts to curb carbon emissions, 2023 saw a continued increase in atmospheric CO₂ levels. According to the Mauna Loa Observatory, CO₂ concentrations peaked at 424 parts per million (ppm) during the year, a stark reminder of the relentless upward trajectory.
Key Contributors:
Energy Sector: Fossil fuels continued to dominate global energy production, with coal consumption hitting record highs in some regions.
Deforestation: Large-scale deforestation in the Amazon and Southeast Asia contributed significantly to carbon emissions.
Industrial Activities: Rapid industrialization in emerging economies exacerbated emissions, outpacing efforts to transition to cleaner technologies.
2023 was a year of extreme weather events that affected millions of lives and ecosystems:
Heatwaves: Record-breaking heatwaves scorched parts of Europe, the United States, and Asia. Southern Europe saw temperatures surpassing 48°C, severely impacting agriculture and water resources.
Flooding: Catastrophic flooding displaced millions in Pakistan, Nigeria, and Italy, with damages running into billions of dollars.
Wildfires: Uncontrollable wildfires ravaged forests in Canada and Greece, releasing massive amounts of carbon and destroying biodiversity hotspots.
Biodiversity loss reached critical levels in 2023, with numerous species teetering on the brink of extinction. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) reported that:
28% of species assessed were threatened with extinction.
Coral reefs, which host 25% of marine species, suffered extensive bleaching due to rising ocean temperatures.
Melting Ice and Rising Seas
The Arctic and Antarctic regions continued to lose ice at alarming rates in 2023. The National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) reported:
The Greenland ice sheet lost an estimated 400 gigatons of ice, contributing significantly to global sea level rise.
Antarctic sea ice reached its lowest extent in recorded history during the winter months.
Plastic pollution remained a critical issue, with over 8 million tons of plastic waste entering the oceans annually. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch expanded further, threatening marine life and ecosystems.
Efforts to Combat Plastic Waste:
Legislative Actions: Countries like Canada and the EU implemented bans on single-use plastics.
Innovative Solutions: Startups and NGOs developed ocean-cleaning technologies and biodegradable alternatives.
The environmental and climate challenges of 2023 serve as a stark reminder of the fragility of our planet. While progress was made in renewable energy and policy initiatives, the pace of degradation continues to outstrip solutions. Addressing these challenges demands an unprecedented level of global cooperation, innovation, and commitment from all sectors of society.
What can you do? Educate yourself, advocate for sustainable policies, and make environmentally conscious choices in your daily life. The fight for our planet’s future requires all hands on deck.
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