Update on Russia blocking Skiff

We've seen reports that Skiff has been blocked in Russia.

Today, we learned that Skiff has been banned in Russia.There is an urgent need for more privacy-respecting communication tools. Over the 7 months since we launched Skiff Mail — private, end-to-end encrypted email — we have seen eager adoption from people who value their privacy all over the world. The platform now counts more than half a million users.

What does this mean?

After reading this article, it appears that Skiff was banned alongside other end-to-end encrypted services. This yields many consequences for users in Russia or the region:

They may be unable to load skiff.com, or our products at app.skiff.com.
Other Russian email servers may be unable to send or receive mail from Skiff.
We’re currently unaware of how widely felt this consequence is.
Additional Skiff products and services, such as Skiff mobile apps, may also function unreliably or not at all in Russia.

What can be done?

As today’s block shows, it’s often the people who could benefit most from privacy that face the steepest odds in accessing it. We’ve been working with our advising team to see how we can restore service in Russia. We’re happy to make our technical team available to help you or your organization. Unsurprisingly, no additional information or context was provided, and the block appears to be completely arbitrary.

What can you do?

Skiff is a private, end-to-end encrypted workspace with Mail, Calendar, Docs, and Drive products for individuals and teams to work securely. We support journalists, companies, and nonprofits all over the world.If you are an existing Skiff user having trouble using our services, please contact us (see many methods in the FAQ below). We also recommend different methods for accessing Skiff when blocked, such as using a VPN.We recommend using Skiff as well as other end-to-end encrypted, privacy-first services no matter the country you are in.Below, we included some FAQ on the block, both for Skiff users in Russia and for those who are around the world.

FAQ

Does this change Skiff’s day-to-day operations? Not at all - if anything, this update strengthens our resolve to build the best privacy-first, end-to-end encrypted workspace and empower people to work freely.How can I access Skiff in Russia? We recommend using a VPN service.Have other questions? Contact us at hello@skiff.org, DM us on Twitter, join our Discord, or post on our subreddit.