From Tutanota to Tuta: Unveiling the New Name

The name change also reflects Tuta's growing ecosystem: Since starting out as an encrypted email service in March 2014, Tuta has launched the first fully encrypted search tool (December 2017), the first fully encrypted desktop clients for private emails (December 2018), and the first encrypted calendar (July 2019), and from the start, Tuta came with a fully encrypted address book. Now, Tuta plans to increase its range of services by offering an encrypted cloud storage solution - turning Tuta into a private ecosystem that encrypts more data end-to-end than any other online service and lets people share this data easily and securely!

At Tuta, we do not simply want to enable people to handle and store their data securely online; the goal is to allow everyone to collaborate easily with secure end-to-end encryption. Imagine simple-to-use online tools with automatic encryption and without any tracking! That's what Tuta is all about: It already offers easy-to-use encrypted emails to anyone, as well as easy sharing and collaborating on encrypted calendars and encrypted mailboxes. Adding an encrypted cloud storage solution that will enable people to share and collaborate on larger encrypted files as well is the next natural step. As innovation leaders in secure communication, we are already working on post-quantum secure encryption for Tuta. As a first step, we have hardened your password protection in Tuta by switching from bcrypt to Argon2. The encrypted drive solution will also be encrypted in a post-quantum secure manner.

The goal of Tuta is that people can easily store and share their data online without having to worry one little bit about malicious or illegal access to their private data.

The Story of How We Got Hold of Tuta.com

It's 2023, and everyone knows that all short domains are taken. So the story of how we got hold of Tuta.com is quite entertaining, and one of our founders, Arne Möhle, will tell this story:

Since the launch of Tutanota in March 2014, we have loved the name and its deep and smart meaning ("secure message" in Latin). Tutanota has proven itself to be the most secure email provider worldwide and has built a great reputation. But despite this, our name was not the easiest for sharing one's email address over the phone or for folks to remember it during a casual conversation. We have been eyeing the tuta-com domain for a while already, but the owner, a resident of Brazil, did not want to sell it via email. Fortunately, after an unsuccessful brainstorming session for a new name for Tutanota, our colleague Vitor, who is originally from Brazil, had planned a trip to São Paulo in 2022. So, long story short: Vitor contacted the domain owner - who would like to remain anonymous, and we fully respect that - and sat down in a restaurant with him. After a splendid meal and a friendly conversation, the two of them signed a contract, and the domain tuta.com is now in our possession! We are excited that we are now the only secure email provider with a four-letter-com domain: tuta.com - short and easy to spell!

Fight for Encryption

Beyond software development, Tuta works together with other privacy rights organizations to combat attempts by governments to introduce legislation that aims to weaken encryption, like Chat Control or the Online Safety Bill.

"We believe that every citizen must have access to securely encrypted communication. Only with encryption can we safeguard our private communications against eavesdropping and malicious access. Having private communication is crucial to our free and open democracies. It's for a reason that the right to privacy is enshrined in the German Constitution, a constitution that was written after World War II with censorship and distortion of public opinion of Hitler's suppressive regime fresh in the memories of politicians. It seems about time that some politicians must be reminded of all the benefits that the right to privacy brings to our democracies. They must stop undermining encryption - if they don't, the opponents of democracy will win", explains Möhle.

By Aman Gaur

Aman, an IT Engineer, combines tech passion and cinephilia in his roles as a content writer and core marketing professional at MobileAppDaily. He crafts blogs, articles, PR, and devises content marketing strategies.