Frequently asked questions¶
What is the difference between chatmail relays and classic email servers?¶
A chatmail relay is a minimal Mail Transport Agent (MTA) setup that goes beyond what classic email servers offer:
Zero State: no private data or metadata collected, messages are auto-deleted, low disk usage
Instant/Realtime: sub-second message delivery, realtime P2P streaming, privacy-preserving Push Notifications for Apple, Google, and Ubuntu Touch;
Security Enforcement: only strict TLS, DKIM and OpenPGP with minimized metadata accepted
Reliable Federation and Decentralization: No spam or IP reputation checks, federating depends on established IETF standards and protocols.
How about interoperability with classic email servers?¶
Generally, chatmail relays interoperate well with classic email servers. However, some chatmail relays may be blocked by Big-Tech email providers that use intransparent and proprietary techniques for scanning and looking at cleartext email messages between users, or because they use questionable IP-reputation systems that break interoperability.
Chatmail relays instead use and require strong cryptography, allowing anyone to participate, without having to submit to Big-Tech restrictions.
How are chatmail relays run? Can I run one myself?¶
Chatmail relays are designed to be very cheap to run, and are generally self-funded by respective operators. All chatmail relays are automatically deployed and updated using the chatmail relay repository. Chatmail relays are composed of proven standard email server components, Postfix and Dovecot, and are configured to run unattended without much maintenance effort. Chatmail relays happily run on low-end hardware like a Raspberry Pi.
How trustable are chatmail relays?¶
Chatmail relays enforce end-to-end encryption, and chatmail clients like Delta Chat enforce end-to-end encryption on their own.
The end-to-end encryption protection includes attached media, user display names, avatars and group names. What is visible to operators is: message date, sender and receiver addresses. Please see the Delta Chat FAQ on encryption and security for further info.