DE-Mail switched off

In Germany, everything has to be in order. At the end of the year, the DE-Mail Act will be repealed. Even though the project was well-intentioned — aiming to provide everyone with encrypted email — its implementation once again ignored people’s interests and habits to such an extent that the initiative had no chance of success. We already said this when it was introduced in 2010 (The Pitfalls of DE-Mail), and things didn’t improve when DE-Mail broke free from Deutsche Telekom’s cocoon.

Neither the successor company United Internet (Web.de and gmx) nor the BSI-certified provider Mentana-Claimsoft were able to make money with the product. This demand for profit, in addition to the practical hurdles, is also the reason for its failure. Since the 1980s, thanks to Phil Zimmermann, there has been a free and open-source encryption option for mails with PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) that anyone can use.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

Read more https://www.heise.de/hintergrund/Missing-Link-Aus-fuer-De-Mail-warum-das-das-eingekringelte-e-besiegte-11305218.html

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