this post was submitted on 29 Jun 2023
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Any advice or hints on how to switch over? I wanted to do it years ago but I dread having to change my main mail address on everything, from apps, tools and games to bills or RL document-related stuff, it sounds like a horrible mess and ton of work
My recommendation (assuming you have a normal @gmail addy and not a custom domain like I had) would be to use email forwarding. So you can leave your Gmail as is, but set it up (in the settings) to automatically forward all your email to your new protonmail address. Then you can gradually change the important contacts/sites to your new email at your leisure.
I do highly recommend buying a domain and setting up your own email address though, it gives you a lot more portability going forward. You can actually do a lot with your own domain, and it helps you maintain trust better.
Anyway, enough preaching lol, protonmail also maintains a guide to help people switch: https://proton.me/easyswitch
If you're recommending setting up a forward/IMAP collection from a Gmail account, don't forget to mention deleting the messages from the server as well! Emails left on a server for more than 30 days are considered "abandoned property" for the purposes of warrantless search.
What an insane fact, I had no idea thanks for sharing 😱
Do you have a source for this?
The most I could find is that the Electronic Communications Privacy Act allows for warrants to be issued for emails less than 180 days old. I've found vague references and snippets from articles no longer available that seem to claim some acts that have passed since then allow for simple subpoenas instead of full on warrants for said emails, but 180 days is the only threshold I've found and again, it's for less than 180 days that's at danger.
Does protonmail support custom domain email addresses?
They do, I have used them myself for years and have no complaints!
If you are setting up a forward/IMAP collection from Gmail though, be sure to set it to delete messages from Gmail after forwarding/collection. Any email you leave on a server longer than 30 days is classified "abandoned property" for the purposes of warrantless searches in the US (and if you're European using Gmail, this applies to you too), even if you're still actively accessing the email inbox.
Thanks for mentioning this provider. I've actually switched over now. You should ask for a referral fee :) After reading about it, I'm quite impressed with their implementation. It's very thorough.
Buying a domain you mean going to a registrar like I did for my lemmy instance?
Or do I need to buy it from an email provider?
If you already have a registered domain there is no need to get a new one.