Dark Alliance Reinvents Email Security
New mail protocol will shut out the NSA and prevent snooping on metadata.
Email technology providers Lavabit and Silent Circle have joined forces to launch the Dark Mail Alliance, a project with the goal of building a truly secure and private email communication system that is resistant to spying and government oversight. The two companies have long been leaders in the field of email encryption and employ an impressive team of cryptologists and programmers. (Phil Zimmerman, creator of the popular PGP email encryption tool, is the President and co-founder of Silent Circle.) Both Lavabit and Silent Circle suspended their email services recently in the wake of revelations about NSA spying and orders to allow government access to encryption keys.
Conventional email encryption tools like PGP can encrypt the contents of a message, but not the subject, to and from fields, or other metadata. Also, messages stored on the server can be encyrpted using the key, which governments can obtain from the vendor through a court order. Dark Mail plans to replace the venerable SMTP mail protocol with a more secure alternative and design an infrastructure that will not be susceptible to snooping.
The new protocol will be based on Silent Circle's instant messaging protocol SCIMP. Dark Mail will resemble ordinary email, but behind the scenes, messages will pass through an encrypted peer-to-peer connection. Keys used for the connection will be deleted afterward, which means the email provider would have no knowledge of the keys and could not surrender them even if ordered to do so.
The tools and protocols developed by the Dark Mail alliance will all be open source, and the alliance welcomes scrutiny from cryptologists and security experts. According to the mission statement on the Dark Mail website, "As founding partners of The Dark Mail Alliance, both Silent Circle and Lavabit will work to bring other members into the alliance, assist them in implementing the new protocol, and jointly work to proliferate the worlds first end-to-end encrypted ‘Email 3.0’ throughout the world’s email providers."
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
Linux Kernel 6.13 Offers Improvements for AMD/Apple Users
The latest Linux kernel is now available, and it includes plenty of improvements, especially for those who use AMD or Apple-based systems.
-
Gnome 48 Debuts New Audio Player
To date, the audio player found within the Gnome desktop has been meh at best, but with the upcoming release that all changes.
-
Plasma 6.3 Ready for Public Beta Testing
Plasma 6.3 will ship with KDE Gear 24.12.1 and KDE Frameworks 6.10, along with some new and exciting features.
-
Budgie 10.10 Scheduled for Q1 2025 with a Surprising Desktop Update
If Budgie is your desktop environment of choice, 2025 is going to be a great year for you.
-
Firefox 134 Offers Improvements for Linux Version
Fans of Linux and Firefox rejoice, as there's a new version available that includes some handy updates.
-
Serpent OS Arrives with a New Alpha Release
After months of silence, Ikey Doherty has released a new alpha for his Serpent OS.
-
HashiCorp Cofounder Unveils Ghostty, a Linux Terminal App
Ghostty is a new Linux terminal app that's fast, feature-rich, and offers a platform-native GUI while remaining cross-platform.
-
Fedora Asahi Remix 41 Available for Apple Silicon
If you have an Apple Silicon Mac and you're hoping to install Fedora, you're in luck because the latest release supports the M1 and M2 chips.
-
Systemd Fixes Bug While Facing New Challenger in GNU Shepherd
The systemd developers have fixed a really nasty bug amid the release of the new GNU Shepherd init system.
-
AlmaLinux 10.0 Beta Released
The AlmaLinux OS Foundation has announced the availability of AlmaLinux 10.0 Beta ("Purple Lion") for all supported devices with significant changes.