Email is not safe. It never was and it never will be. This doesn’t mean we have to give up.

The important thing is not security (there are other ways to communicate securely, like Signal, Session, and SimpleX (even more alternatively, use XMPP, or matrix)), but rather ownership. Most people use Google/Microsoft/Apple, which is the primary evil we are running away from.

Regarding why check this video out.

Now that we understand that the main goal is claiming our data back from Big Tech, there are many small email providers that one can use; otherwise one can host their own email server.

I have heard that running your own email server is a hassle, and that you need to do some extra things in order to actually host and secure it. Because of this, I use a third-party provider.

The email provider I use is Fastmail, but in all earnest it doesn’t really matter. I chose them because I have more than one domain, and fastmail supports importing as many domains as you own, and also allows you to create as many aliases as you want.
(For context, Proton allows 1 custom domain in their base plan, and infinite aliases, and Tuta offers three custom domains, but 15 aliases. Fastmail offers unlimited custom domains and unlimited aliases.)

The only reason I am comfortable using Fastmail is because I am not the citizen of a country in the Five/Six/Nine/Fourteen Eyes— international spying organizations that exchange information about their own citizens and/or citizens of hostile nations. If you are a citizen of:

• the USA
• the UK
• New Zealand
• Australia
• Canada
• Denmark
• France
• the Netherlands
• Norway
• Belgium
• Germany
• Italy
• Spain
• Sweden

If you are a citizen of one of the above countries, you are kindly encouraged to use Proton exclusively, assuming you care about privacy.
Do not use either Fastmail or Tuta.

Proton and Tuta try to be closer to a whole Cloud account (with services like Drive, Docs, etc), but in all earnest I just want an email, since I self-host my own cloud.

The only caveat with all this is that you do have to pay for your email. In essence you give money for the convinience of not having to maintain your own server, as well as to not have to worry about your email getting flagged as spam by major providers. Plus, you pay so you dont become the product.

I might self-host an email server once I have the ability to control which ports I have open (so when I move out from my current house). If I do, I will update this.

If you want to self-host an email server check this out. In general check out LandChad.net. Note that this guide assumes Debian/Ubuntu.

The above guide by the LandChads doesn’t work with NixOS. If you choose to follow that guide, you might end up needing a dedicated server for emails.