[laurent92]

I confirm, excellent email provider.

I won’t comment on privacy since they are based in Australia which doesn’t have freedom of speech and has blanket surveillance laws. But at least it’s not Gmail, so it is safer to conduct business where Google could be competitor.

[thismodernlife]

Yes the Australia thing is unfortunate for them but I imagine this may change over time with a new administration.

I’m not too bothered by it, it’s email and I’m more concerned about high quality product, availability, stability and them not selling my data or using it for ads.

If I wanted to send something truly private by email I’d just use GPG :-)

[skissane]

> Yes the Australia thing is unfortunate for them but I imagine this may change over time with a new administration.

What do you mean by "new administration"? Do you mean if Australia has a change of government? (The term "administration" is used in presidential systems like the US, not parliamentary systems like Australia.)

Both major parties in Australia are big fans of surveillance so I don't think a change of government would make any significant difference to Australia's surveillance laws. The police and intelligence agencies start up a chorus of "we need this to stop terrorists and pedophiles" and both sides of politics reply "of course! of course! whatever you need!"

I don't think the legal situation for Fastmail in Australia is hugely different from that in other countries – look at national security letters in the US, bulk collection warrants issued by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, etc. Yes, the Australian government can demand information but the same is true in many other countries. The most disturbingly unique thing about Australian laws is the government could – at least in theory – order a company to circumvent encryption or insert spyware into their product's code. Given Fastmail has all the data in cleartext, and it is server-based, I don't think Fastmail has to worry about such orders from the Australian government, they aren't relevant to Fastmail's product.

But if Australian law does become a big issue for their business, they could always relocate elsewhere.

[ocdtrekkie]

Indeed, people have drama'd a lot about Australia's surveillance laws, but they have little applicability to Fastmail. Additionally, if you are worried about government surveillance, your safest bet is just to be storing your data under someone else's government.

If you live in the US, it's very easy for the US to get your data, and more irritating for the US to ask Australia for your data.

[wolco5]

Australia is part of the 5 eyes alliance which automatically shares data between the US/Canada/UK/New Zealand which means it is a safe bet that the US can get this data as easily as it would be on it's own soil.

As an American storing data in Australia creates another problem. The US can't spy in the US on it's own citizens but another country can at the request of the US government and will report everything back to the US.

I would pick Russia or China first...

Or just use protonmail which is designed to offer some protection.

[ocdtrekkie]

This kinda depends whose radar you are trying to stay off of...

If you are planning to be a terrorist, having data in a Five Eyes country is a bad thing, because the CIA can probably get it easily. However, for your garden variety crime, no, the local police department can't easily get the CIA to get information from Australia for them.

So depending on your threat model, this may or may not be a big deal.

[thismodernlife]

Apologies for incorrect political parlance! Yes, I meant a change of government. You’re probably right but one can hope and dream ;-)

[lillecarl]

I don't understand why they stay in Oz. What's the point? Being a SaaS provider they should be able to set up camp in Switzerland and be done with the privacy concerns.

[robjan]

The data centre is located in New York but the staff are in Aus. I guess it's hard to move all of the staff to another country, many of whom are probably quite attached to Aus.

[lillecarl]

Oh sorry for my ambiguity. I meant something like:

1. Get capacity in Switzerland

2. Move data there (big project ofc)

3. Start swizz business

4. Move customer billing to swizz company

5. Make Australian company bill swizz company enough to pay the wages and offices

6. You're now technically not part of spyware haven anymore. (employees could still be pressed for backdoors I guess, but it'd look a lot better on paper)

Loads of VPN companies do this kind of move, though they rent colo all over the place usually.

I did that backpacker year in Australia, believe me I understandthat people don't want to move. It's as close to paradise as I I can imagine a place on earth could be.

I realise its not as simple as projected here, but it must've crossed their minds, as a fastmail customer myself I would like to read about the thought process on the topic.

[csomar]

Their servers seems to be hosted in the USA though. That means they should be subject to US laws?

[amaccuish]

> based in Australia which doesn’t have freedom of speech

By that definition, which countries have freedom of speech? And why must America be the definition of freedom of speech?

[chrisseaton]

> they are based in Australia which doesn’t have freedom of speech

Which countries do have freedom of speech?

[tmpxgdqrcKFuG]

In the US, companies have the freedom to take away an individuals freedom of speech.

[throwaheyy]

What? That makes no sense.

Twitter can’t stop Trump from publishing his own website, nor shouting in a public square, nor just talking in front of the live camera he literally had in his own home but seemed unable to use.

[tmpxgdqrcKFuG]

They can stop Trump from posting on Twitter but I was also being facetious.