Email providers
Atomic Mail privacy rating
Email service from AtomicMail Systems OÜ in Estonia, with a free plan and paid Plus and Business plans. Mail between Atomic Mail users can be end-to-end encrypted, and password-protected mail can be sent to others.
Summary
Atomic Mail scores 25 out of 100 (grade F) on the email providers criteria. It meets 2 of 21 criteria: no ads or data sales and sign up without personal data. It partly meets transparency report, TLS configuration, modern web standards, end-to-end encryption, encrypted mailbox storage and custom domains. It does not meet open source, no trackers or telemetry, independent audit, tells users about requests, security headers, open protocols, email security standards, IMAP support, POP3 support, SMTP submission, mail transport security, Sender Rewriting Scheme and ARC sealing. It is based in Estonia: Not in the Five, Nine or Fourteen Eyes; EU member (GDPR). Automated tests: SSL Labs grade A-, Mozilla HTTP Observatory grade C-, Internet.nl website score 75% and Internet.nl email score 64%.
Score 25 out of 100. How scoring works
Criteria
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No
Open source Weight 3 of 3
Is all the source code needed to run the product public?
Closed source. No source code for the apps or the server is published.
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No
No trackers or telemetry Weight 3 of 3
Are the website and apps free of third-party trackers, with any analytics anonymous and any telemetry off by default?
The home page loads Google Tag Manager with a Google Analytics tag and includes Hotjar code, although the privacy policy says atomicmail.io uses only self-hosted analytics. The web app code includes PostHog product analytics.
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Yes
No ads or data sales Weight 2 of 3
Is the product funded without advertising, ad targeting or selling user data?
Funded by paid plans. No ads in any service, and personal data is not sold.
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No
Independent audit Weight 2 of 3
Has an independent security or privacy audit been published within the last three years?
The FAQ says third-party audits take place, but no audit report is published.
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Partial
Transparency report Weight 2 of 3
Does the provider regularly publish how many government and legal requests it receives and how it responds?
Only requests from Estonian judicial authorities are answered, after legal review. No request counts are published.
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No
Tells users about requests Weight 1 of 3
Does the provider promise to tell users about requests for their data, unless a court forbids it?
No published policy on notifying users about data requests.
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Partial
End-to-end encryption Weight 3 of 3
Can mail be end-to-end encrypted so that the provider cannot read message contents?
Atomic Encryption between users and password-protected mail for others are built in, but each message must be encrypted by choice. Not on by default.
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Partial
Encrypted mailbox storage Weight 3 of 3
Is stored mail encrypted with a key the provider does not hold?
Stored mail is encrypted, but mail that was not end-to-end encrypted is not covered by zero-access encryption and can be disclosed under a legal order.
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No
Open protocols Weight 2 of 3
Can any standard app connect over IMAP, POP3, SMTP, CalDAV or CardDAV, without extra software?
No IMAP, POP3 or SMTP access. Mail can only be used in Atomic Mail's own apps.
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Partial
Custom domains Weight 1 of 3
Can mail be sent and received with your own domain?
Only on the Business plans. Not on the free or Plus plans.
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Yes
Sign up without personal data Weight 2 of 3
Can an account be created without a phone number or another email address?
Sign-up asks only for a name, username and password. No phone number or other email address is needed.
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No
Sender Rewriting Scheme Weight 1 of 3
Is the envelope sender rewritten with SRS when mail is forwarded, so forwarded mail keeps passing SPF?
No published documentation on SRS for forwarded mail.
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No
ARC sealing Weight 1 of 3
Does the provider validate and add ARC (RFC 8617) signatures, so authentication results survive forwarding?
No published documentation on ARC signing or validation.
Automated tests
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Partial
TLS configuration Weight 2 of 3
Does the website pass the Qualys SSL Labs test with a grade of A or better?
Grade A-
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No
Security headers Weight 1 of 3
Does the website pass the Mozilla HTTP Observatory test with a grade of A or better?
Grade C- (45/100+)
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Partial
Modern web standards Weight 1 of 3
Does the website score 90% or higher on the Internet.nl website test?
Score 75%
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No
Email security standards Weight 2 of 3
Does the mail domain score 90% or higher on the Internet.nl email test?
Score 64%
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No
IMAP support Weight 2 of 3
Does the IMAP server accept connections over implicit TLS on port 993 and advertise IMAP4rev1 or IMAP4rev2 with IDLE push?
Not offered.
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No
POP3 support Weight 1 of 3
Does the POP3 server accept connections over implicit TLS on port 995 and answer CAPA with UIDL?
Not offered.
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No
SMTP submission Weight 2 of 3
Does mail submission work over implicit TLS on port 465 with SMTPUTF8, 8BITMIME, PIPELINING and AUTH?
Not offered.
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No
Mail transport security Weight 3 of 3
Does the mail domain enforce encrypted, authenticated delivery with MTA-STS, DANE, DNSSEC, TLS-RPT and an enforced DMARC policy?
Passes: SPF, DMARC reject. Missing: MTA-STS missing, TLS-RPT, DNSSEC, DANE none.
Email standards
- Yes: Mail serversMXmail1.atomicmail.io
- Yes: RFC 7208 sender policySPFpublished
- Yes: RFC 7489. Quarantine or reject counts as enforcedDMARCp=reject
- No: RFC 8461 strict transport securityMTA-STSmissing
- No: RFC 8460 TLS failure reportsTLS-RPTmissing
- No: RFC 4033 signed DNSDNSSECnot validated
- No: RFC 7672 TLSA records on MX hostsDANEnone
- No: Brand logo record (not scored)BIMInone
- No: RFC 6186 and RFC 8314 service records (not scored)SRVnone
IMAP
Not offered.
POP3
Not offered.
SMTP submission
Not offered.
Capabilities are what each server advertises before login. How these tests work