Sylpheed

Sylpheed is a free/libre email client for Linux/Mac/Window$. The app is a more functional, lighter, and free replacement for the default mail application included on most Systems. It supports both POP3 and IMAP mailboxes. Sylpheed also supports encrypting and signing of messages.

You can install Sylpheed from sylpheed.sraoss.jp/en. For Debian-based Linux, you can install by typing:

sudo apt-get install sylpheed

Sylpheed is very easy to set up.

  1. Install, as mentioned above (or in Sylpheed documentation)
  2. Open Sylpheed.
  3. Select either POP or IMAP (if you don’t know the difference, and plan to use this email account on multiple devices select IMAP).
  4. Click Forward.
  5. Enter your riseup email address ‘youruser@riseup.net’.
  6. Give the account a name if you like, and add your name in the name field. Please be aware that this information will be transmitted when you send mail from this device, so do not use your real name unless you wish recipients to known it.
  7. Click Forward.
  8. Fill the information in with ‘youruser’ and ‘yourpassword’ and mail.riseup.net (for both incoming and outgoing servers).
  9. Select SSL/TLS for both. To use SSL/TLS for SMTP use the smtp port 587 in advanced options.
  10. Select Use SMTP Authentication.
  11. Click Forward.
  12. You are done configuring your email client! Make sure to test your ability to send/receive mail!

Enhance your email security

  • Encrypt your mail! For enhanced message security use Шифрование электронной почты.
  • There are many vulnerabilities with how secure connections work. If you need high security, you should always connect to Riseup services using the Riseup VPN. This will prevent a long list of potential attacks against your communication.
  • To enhance connection security you can use Onion Service configuration to connect to Riseup’s .onion services for IMAP and SMTP. Look for the onion address for mail.riseup.net and smtp.riseup.net addresses and use those instead. Note: * SMTP port 465 is often blocked by exit nodes, but port 587 is less frequently blocked. If you have a problem sending mail, try port 587 or configure your client to use Riseup’s email hidden service in place of the regular mail.riseup.net domain. This is better than sending traffic through a Tor exit as it is MITM resistant, but it will generate certificate errors on the client side.