Today, a private email system is an essential tool for anyone creating value and protecting their reputation. It can help small businesses, trusted professional advisors, and families keep their information safe from cyber-security threats.

Unlike "free" email systems, private email systems are built for user experience and security. That means they offer robust features, plug into your email software, and can be scaled to fit your needs.

Email Server

Email servers are the backbone of internet communication. This is because they manage incoming and outgoing messages using standardized protocols, including Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), IMAP, POP3, and more.

Every email message is a tiny bundle of text files and attachments that are broken down into smaller packets as it travels through the internet. The sender uploads these packets to the server and the recipient downloads them from there.

Typically, the server is tied to a specific company like Google, Microsoft, or Apple. This means that the company can scan emails to improve their services or provide targeted advertisements.

However, private mail servers give users more control over their email storage and access, which can be useful if you’re concerned about privacy. They also give you more flexibility in managing your messages, including the choice of software to display them on screen and how aggressively spam filters are set.

Setting up a private email server can be a bit complicated, but it’s not impossible. There are many tutorials available for newcomers to the field.

Storage and Backup

Backing up email data and archives is a crucial part of any security-conscious firm. While backups are primarily a means of disaster recovery, email archiving systems are designed to archive emails over many years in a form that is tamper-proof and permanently available.

Mail Backup X is a powerful tool for keeping track of your mails and files from major mail services like Gmail, Apple Mail, Microsoft Outlook, Office 365 and more. It allows you to search and view your archives, highly compress your archives up to 3x, mirror your archive on your cloud storage or USB drive and more.

Mail Backup X also supports reading and importing of common mail archive file formats (.mbox,.rge,.olm,.olk,.pst,.eml) used by most popular mail clients like Outlook Mac, Outlook Windows, Office 365, Thunderbird, Postbox, Gmail, Yahoo, etc. Plus, it includes professional grade inbuilt Mail Viewers so you can read any imported archive file or email without switching between a different mail client.

Security

The best private mail service providers take a variety of security measures to protect your data. These measures include Transport Layer Security (TLS), which encrypts emails in transit to the server.

They also strip metadata headers to help prevent unwanted snooping. In addition, some providers offer end-to-end encryption that protects your email content at all times, both in transit and on their servers.

Proton Mail for example, uses PGP encryption to encrypt your messages. It is also one of the few email providers that offer two-factor authentication.

Using end-to-end encryption, your emails can only be read by you and those you authorize. That’s the best way to protect your privacy and avoid being exposed to malware, spam, or phishing attacks.

Privacy

Despite the rise of messaging apps, email remains one of the most popular and widely used communication tools. This means that people are sending and receiving confidential information in great numbers, putting them at risk of attacks, identity theft and other types of online fraud.

This makes it important to ensure that you are using a private email service that encrypts all of your emails and data in transit and on the server. The best email services use end-to-end encryption (E2EE) that enables you to send and receive your messages without anyone being able to read them except you.

Private mail service providers also offer a variety of other products and services to help you keep your privacy. These include virtual mailboxes that allow you to control your email from anywhere, packaging and shipping services to help you save money on shipping costs and a variety of other options for those who want to have more control over their private communications.