607 – Safe secure email: Tom talks Proton Mail

Episode 607 – Proton Mail
[00:00:09] Welcome to Screw the Commute. The entrepreneurial podcast dedicated to getting you out of the car and into the money, with your host, lifelong entrepreneur and multimillionaire, Tom Antion.

[00:00:24] Hey everybody, it's Tom here with episode 607 of Screw the Commute podcast. I'm here talking about Protonmail today. Now, if you're worried about email privacy, I've got the program for you. Now, I hope you didn't miss Episode 606. That was a business card trick, which I really, really should call it a technique rather than a trick. But hardly anyone does it. But this this thing that I revealed on episode 606 will get you way more website traffic from your business card than fancy paper stock or cute pop up designs will want to be way cheaper. So check that out. Episode 606 Anytime you want to get to a back episode, you put screwthecommute.com, a slash and then the episode number. That was 606 and today is 607. Now pick up a copy of our automation book. This is not any kind of little three page checklist. This is a 60, 70 page book that shows you all the things that I do that have allowed me to handle up to 150,000 subscribers and 65,000 customers without pulling my hair out. So pick up your copy at screwthecommute.com/automatefree. While you're at it, pick up a copy of our podcast app at screwthecommute.com/app. You can put us on your cell phone and tablet and take us with you on the road.

[00:01:56] All right. Let's get into the main event. Email. If you're if you're using standard email services for convenience and no expense, you need to realize what you are giving up. And I must say, what you're giving up may be perfectly okay with you. I just want to make sure you have thought the use of these services through so you can make an informed decision. Also, if privacy is important to you, you must go a little further in your use of email to make sure you can't be snooped upon by competitors and hackers and other prying eyes. Now, when I talk about free services, I'm usually referring to Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, and I think AOL still has a free version. I don't know, maybe not. I haven't checked on it in a long time. Anyway, before I get into the privacy issues, I'll address the business issues that make you look bad if you use these free accounts. For business, you should be using an email that has your domain name in it. There's no disputing this. If you use a Yahoo account for business, you are immediately sending a message that you aren't serious. You're a cheap business. You're not substantial and may not even be around as someone has trouble with your product or service, which would make them reluctant to buy. And it goes on and on. And you just look bad in your business if you use these services as your business email. Now, do you really want to look bad? I don't think so. Now. Do I use some of these services? Yes, I do, but typically not as a standalone. For instance, when booking podcast interviews, I tell people to email me at Tom@screwthecommute.com and copy it to TomAntion@gmail.com.

[00:03:55] Now. There's nothing wrong with this at all. People see my screwthecommute.com address, which sends the message that I'm serious. And then they see the Gmail address that looks like a backup or a personal address. This sends the message that I'm totally serious about not missing their email, and some of them might think I'm sending a copy to an assistant. Whatever they think along these lines is better than them thinking, I'm not substantial enough to have an email address with my domain name in it. Now, one other thing. Gmail does have a way and it's a little bit complicated to use their service with your domain name. And I've used it once in a while. But even though it takes care of the looking bad issue that I just talked about, it still doesn't get you out of privacy issues, which I'll talk about now. All these free services have to make money somehow. The two major ways are they sell your data and they sell ads. Since I don't do anything nefarious, I don't really care if they sell my interest in, let's say, pressure washing to chemical companies who want to sell me pressure washing chemicals. I don't really care. I don't really talk about it or have anything to do with bad things that I'm embarrassed being seen by pretty much anybody. So my primary interest in using my domain name in my email is about looking good in from a business standpoint.

[00:05:35] Now, if my business had proprietary formulas or business info, that would be of interest to industrial spies, well, then maybe I might worry about it more. But a typical email of mine might have something to do with website design or email marketing or something benign like that that I'm not really worried about. But if you have sensitive material that you must convey to someone and you don't want it seen by anyone other than the recipient of the email, then a different and more security respected email program may be warranted. So in steps, the eight year old Switzerland based protonmail. This email program was designed by people involved in nuclear research in Europe, and they were worried about spies getting hold of the research. Over 300 researchers and students tested the original protonmail. It has what is called end to end encryption. This means when you send an email, your data is already encrypted by the time it reaches the Protonmail servers. Protonmail people have no access to your messages and they can't decrypt them. I personally don't think anything is 100% secure. I'm sure if a court order came along, you know, they'd still have to dummy up some information about you, but you can't see inside your emails. So Protonmail is kind of as close as it gets for the consumer market to great privacy. You can start with a free account. Well, wait a minute, Tom. You said free services have to pay the bills somehow. Well, yes, that's true. Protonmail has a free account, but you can upgrade to higher amounts of storage and more than one email address and a bunch of other upgrades you can get for money.

[00:07:35] And none of it is that expensive, though. I think the highest level package they have is only $119 a year. You can also get a highly respected VPN from them. The free version is darn good and the paid version just gives you more servers to choose from. Now, if you don't know what a VPN is, it stands for Virtual Private Network and it allows you to appear to be located somewhere else. And again, there are perfectly legitimate business reasons why you might want to appear to be somewhere else. Many of the reasons have to do with advertising in places where you aren't based. And I highly suggest you listen to Episode 589 on VPNs that screw the commute to 589. So Protonmail is a service that's extremely inexpensive, highly respected for privacy, and you can start with a free version and upgrade if necessary, to bigger amounts of storage. And if you're worried about security, that's currently the place to go. Now, if you want help with this and 1000 other things you need to know to be successful online, check out my mentor program at GreatInternetMarketingTraining.com. It's the longest running, most successful and most unique program ever in the field of Internet and digital marketing. Love to hear from you and be glad to help you along your way to an online business. All right. We'll securely see you at Protonmail. All right. Catch you later.