Starting on January 23, 2023, an undefined government agency in Russia has blocked access to skiff.com, the website of the decentralized, secure email service Skiff.
Skiff is a private end-to-end encrypted, decentralized workspace offering Mail, Calendar, Docs, and cloud storage services (Drive) for individuals who need to work, collaborate, or communicate securely.
Although Skiff launched its Mail service fairly recently, seven months ago, it quickly gained popularity among journalists, non-profit organizations, activists, and other sensitive categories of people living in oppressive countries where state services commonly snoop on communications.
Skiff Mail has over 100,000 downloads on Google Play alone, allowing users to communicate securely on the go. The developer of Skiff claims its products are used by a total of 500,000 people from around the world.
The Russian block on Skiff comes after the authorities in the country prohibited access to similar services, such as Proton Mail, Tutanota, and Mailbox.org, on unfounded allegations about facilitating the communication of terrorists and the distribution of fake news.
reestr.rublacklist.net
The justification given this time, according to the Russian digital rights and internet freedom observatory ‘Roskomsvoboda’, is that Skiff was used to distribute false reports.
The organization comments that the blocking order was most probably given by the Prosecutor General’s Office, which has been historically handling this type of cases.
RestorePrivacy has contacted Skiff to comment on the Russian block, and a spokesperson responded with the statement below.
Today, we learned that Skiff has been banned in Russia.
There is an urgent need for more privacy-respecting communication tools. Over the seven months since we launched Skiff Mail — private, end-to-end encrypted email — we have seen eager adoption from people who value their privacy all over the world. The platform now counts more than half a million users.
As today’s block shows, it’s often the people who could benefit most from privacy that face the steepest odds in accessing it. We’ve been working with our advising team, including the CTO of Signal and CEO of Trail of Bits, to see how we can restore service in Russia.
Russian users who need to continue using Skiff despite the imposed blocks in their country may source the software from this GitHub repository and then use a VPN to route their traffic outside of Russia, if possible.
In this case, the ISPs (internet service providers) in Russia impose the on the IP level, so VPNs and proxies might do the trick, but there’s no guarantee of that.
Update: We now have a Skiff Mail review published.
I think you meant to write “Starting on January 23, 2023” instead of 2022
Yep, you are correct. Typo fixed; thanks!
https://app.skiff.com/docs/db93c237-84c2-4b2b-9588-19a7cd2cd45a#tyGksN9rkqbo2uGYASxsA6HVLjUoly/wTYK8tncTto8=
> B. Information Collected Automatically
We may collect certain information automatically when you visit our website or use the services to provide and measure our services and for security and fraud prevention purposes:
• Automatic Data Collection. In order to protect you and our platform from malicious activity and to prevent fraud, we may collect certain information automatically when you use our Services, such as your Internet protocol (IP) address (temporarily), user settings, and Skiff-provided authentication cookies. We may also temporarily collect information regarding your use of our Services, such as pages that you visit before, during and after using our Services, the frequency and duration of your activities, and other information about how you use our Services.<
"Pages you visit before, after and after using our Services"
I'll pass.
In my opinion, it is now, not only essential to have a VPN, but one with your own static I.P address.
I signed up with Surfshark recently…again & again, I have issues with websites that block the I.P address, that I never had with NordVPN (if only they’d been more helpful with the payment issue), as Surfshark allow people to use as many devices as they like, which means they obviously share it with many people, which is good in a sense, but causes many I.P addresses to get blacklisted.
My wife has just signed up for Trust Zone…meh, they’re alright, a bit limited, but how I think they make their money is through static IP addresses as they’re cheaper than the competition.
As for Russia, well it’s hardly a surprise is it? A friend of mine lives there & has told us all sorts & the only VPN that they’ve found is reliable out there is Astrill VPN, as their tech, apparently is quite good, although their software on Windows/Android/iOS looks quite outdated.
Could do with a review of them actually
….You do know that Nord now owns Surfshark, right?
Covered here.
Course I do. Just because they own them, doesn’t mean their software is the same, it clearly isn’t.
Skiff.com is blocking my VPN IP address so good luck signing up
Eyup. Many services block VPNs. Expect more behaviour like this. Sites and institutions, such as banks want a fingerprint trail of your activity.
If you don’t like it, don’t go online, is their mindset. Only government intervention (legislation) can stop this from becoming mainstream.
“goverment intervention ” hahahah please . Goverments on earth want your data and everything about you for agenda21 .If you believe in goverment or any politic you lost my friend . Sorry
What VPN?
Can you review Skiff?
Yep we’re planning on it soon.
Can you review ChatGPT? Media everywhere are talking about it. If you can place an emphasis on many services adamant you need an actual mobile number (not VOIP) to register and use their service. Privacy and selling your information is a major concern here. Robocallers buy our numbers in addition to random dialers too.