The 8232 Project

I trust code more than politics.

Last Notes

2024-06-14 19:28:06 UTC

I was researching WebMail providers, and noticed that most WebMail providers recommended in privacy communities are labelled as proprietary by [AlternativeTo](https://alternativeto.net/ ).
I made a list of WebMail providers, private or not, to see which ones were actually open source:
###
Proprietary
[AOL Mail](https://mail.aol.com/ ): Free
[Cock.li](https://cock.li/ ): Free
[CounterMail](https://countermail.com/ ): Paid
[Fastmail](https://www.fastmail.com/ ): Paid
[GMX Mail](https://www.gmx.com/mail/ ): Free
[Gmail](https://gmail.com ): Free
[HEY Email](https://www.hey.com/ ): Paid
[Hushmail](https://www.hushmail.com/ ): Paid
[iCloud Mail](https://www.icloud.com/mail ): Free
[Mail.com](https://www.mail.com/ ): Free
[Mailbox.org](https://mailbox.org ): Paid
[Mailfence](https://mailfence.com ): Freemium
[Outlook.com](https://outlook.com ): Freemium
[Posteo](https://posteo.de/en ): Paid
[Rediffmail](https://businessemail.rediff.com/ ): Paid
[Riseup](https://riseup.net/ ): Free
[Runbox](https://runbox.com/ ): Paid
[Soverin](https://www.soverin.com/ ): Paid
[StartMail](https://www.startmail.com/ ): Paid
[Yahoo! Mail](https://mail.yahoo.com ): Freemium
[Yandex Mail](https://mail.yandex.com ): Freemium
[Zoho Mail](https://www.zoho.com/us/mail/ ): Freemium
###
Open source
[Criptext](https://www.criptext.com/ ): Free
[Disroot](https://disroot.org/en/services/email ): Free
[Forward Email](https://forwardemail.net/en ): Freemium
[Infomaniak kMail](https://www.infomaniak.com/en/hosting/service-mail ): Freemium
[Kolab Now](https://kolabnow.com ): Paid
[Lavabit](https://lavabit.com/ ): Paid
[Mailpile](https://www.mailpile.is/ ): Free
[Proton Mail](https://proton.me/mail ): Freemium
[Roundcube](https://roundcube.net/ ): Free
[Skiff](https://skiff.com/ ): Freemium
[Tuta](https://tuta.com ): Freemium
Unless I’m missing something, it seems like people overlook this when deciding on WebMail providers. Is it a distinction between a proprietary backend server and a proprietary app, or is there a different way to decide if a WebMail provider is proprietary vs. open source? Lavabit was labelled proprietary by AlternativeTo, but open source by Wikipedia.
#
Note
If I have labelled an open source WebMail provider as proprietary by mistake, please provide evidence by linking to the source code, and I will happily change it.