Originally posted at ShopCanadianStuff.ca/blog which has no affiliation to NorthMail.ca
I noticed NorthMail.ca which I had previously only know for being a Canadian hosted and owned free webmail provider was now listing Video Calls and an office suite as features.
Oddly enough Northmail was featured in a recent monologue joke on Late Night with Seth Meyers. You can see the joke on TikTok here or at 7:15 on this YouTube video of the show.
I tried out the video calling and it works pretty well though it is not obvious how to do it.
I made a brief guide on how to use the video calling feature in this blog post at ShopCanadianStuff.ca/blog
NorthMail.ca has many other features, a calendar, file and photo storage, dark mode and other theme customization. Language settings allow for both English and French as well as many other languages.
The paid premium version of NorthMail.ca provides 100 GB of storage (1GB for free version), no ads, and promises a faster smoother experience for $0.99/month.
If you sign up soon you can get a pretty good pick of the available email addresses so you don't have to go with something as long a BuyCanadianElbowsUp_1867@NorthMail.ca unless you want something that long.
If anyone is concerned about if Northmail.ca is actually Canadian, the owners name is listed on their website, I checked their linked in page which lists the same person as their CIRA domain registration.
To find more Canada made products and services check out ShopCanadianStuff.ca
On the one hand, I like that we have a Canadian email service.
On the other hand, being required to give my phone number for signup was an instant nope.
According to the privacy policy page they use the phone number only to send a verification code. Maybe you could use a virtual number type app for that... I have no idea how secure something like that would be I've never used one.
I know google can give you temporary phone numbers that are intended to be used for work so you don't give your private number. Could probably be used for this. Although if you ever need to recover your email using that phone number, you might be SOL.
I was also thinking 2FA for higher security
On the other other hand, it could somewhat make sure only Canadians are using it? Assuming it accepts only Canadian phone numbers. Although I don't think that really means anything with email accounts.
Ngl, I'd love to see online communities where you have to actually verify that you are a real Canadian citizen speaking and not an astroturfing bot or troll-baiter. It's so annoying seeing a person online roleplaying or misleading people to believe they are a Canadian and then you check their post history and they're blatantly not. Or the people that feel compelled to give their wildly uninformed opinions on Canadian topics. I hate to imagine how many people are smart enough to hide they're not Canadian and influencing Canadian online forums.
I think anonymity on the internet is a double edged sword, but one side is getting a lot duller while the side that cuts us only gets sharper. Especially considering the implications of AI.
Good point actually, I just try avoiding connecting my personal identity to my online one as much as I can since I like that separation so that only people I truly trust can see what I interact with.
I'm really touchy with my privacy online, almost to the point of paranoia to be honest.
Same, but to a lesser degree. I don't ever lie about who I am, but I split it between several accounts to keep a veil of plausible deniability. And most critically, I never post photos of me or anything or anywhere people who know me could identify.
That is actually why I enjoy lemmy.ca, it is a mostly safe bet to assume most people on here, especially the Canadian communities, are actual real Canadians. But that will surely change once the community grows and more bad faith actors or general idiots come on to these discussions.
As Lemmy.ca gets bigger and bigger I think there should be serious consideration put into how to tackle these issues. I'm fine speaking with anonymous people globally, but for certain topics I'd prefer to know if the person I'm speaking to is even Canadian.
How to verify that while keeping privacy is a tough one, I don't have an answer. IP locking would help, but it is insanely trivial to get a VPN nowadays. A good start would probably be making verification entirely voluntary, and just see how that goes. Or, just give user flairs (once they are added) to users who have a history of engaging with local Canadian communities on Lemmy. It would be a safe bet to assume they are Canadians, or at least having to put in exorbitant amounts of effort to lie.
That is already happening to some degree, albeit lesser than, say, reddit.
Yep, lemmy is mostly flying under the radar at the moment but I suspect it would be rather trivial to do the same stuff here as on reddit. The Canadian subreddits there are infamous for heavy astroturfing allegations.
I think most people concerned with privacy have anonymous email accounts and at least one tied to their real identity. How do you communicate with your prospective employer? Your family? Your lawyer? That email should protect your privacy, but it sure isn’t anonymous.