Why do journalists need Secure Connect? Five Testimonials.

Secure Connect is an easy-to-use encrypted contact form for websites. Here journalists say why they use Secure Connect.

2019-06-25 / Updated 2021-07-09
Secure email service Tutanota has recently published Secure Connect, an open source encrypted contact form, that lets anyone get in touch with you securely encrypted - directly on your website. For the first time, any website can easily offer an encrypted communication channel to all their website visitors.

Secure Connect for confidential contact

Secure Connect is an easy-to-use tool to enable a first encrypted contact via your website. Use cases are manifold as the encrypted contact form enables people to send you confidential data easily via your website:

  • CVs,
  • financial information,
  • tax statements,
  • official documents,
  • basically any document that contains confidential information.

Check out our demo of Secure Connect.

Secure Connect Preview

Secure Connect for freedom of speech

Apart from these business use cases, journalists have a great need for Secure Connect as whistleblowers can use this tool to pass on confidential information easily and securely. To support our mission for freedom of speech, we are donating Secure Connect to journalists and news sites.

In this video, prepared for RightsCon 2021, we demonstrate how news sites have added Secure Connect to their websites.

Testimonials by journalists

The following feedback was given by some of the first users of Secure Connect - two months after its launch.

Security Without Borders

Secure Connect is, to begin with, a very simple way to set up a contact form on your website. It took me just a few minutes to add Tutanota Secure Connect to my website. On top of that, the security and confidentiality properties it inherits from Tutanota's technology, really makes it a service with great potential for those like us looking to provide a mean to securely contact us. Secure Connect is a service with great promise that fills a vacuum currently existing in enabling secure external contact. I'm looking forward to how it will develop further.

Confidential communication online is a necessary safeguard for the protection of everyone's fundamental right to privacy and freedom of expression. Encryption technology, such as Secure Connect, enables people to have agency over how they exchange information, think, create, and live in today's hyper-connected society. Without encryption, we abdicate our rights and give into the chilling effects of modern surveillance.

Europa Blog

In the past few years whistleblowers have been prosecuted for leaking important information to the public. This shows that the safety and anonymity of whistleblowers is vital. My blog focuses on political issues so I want to give potential whistleblowers the best possible protection available.

I have been using Tutanota a long time already, and Tutanota has been proven secure. That's why Secure Connect is a great tool which offers what I need: Whistleblowers now can contact me securely and even drop files into the encrypted contact form.

Sports Leaks: Benficagate

First, I would like to give some setting about the website and what it is for. We created the website, after being banned twice from Twitter, for exposing crimes that are happening in Portugal. From corruption, in sports and outside, money laundering, tax fraud, crime coverup and industrial espionage, that is being done by a major Portuguese Club, called Sport Lisboa and Benfica. These crimes were investigated from emails released in a blog called “Mercado de Benfica”, allegedly run by one of the minds behind Football Leaks, Rui Pinto.

As in Portugal, we tend to shoot the messenger instead of looking at the contents of the messages, our twitter accounts were mass reported and brought down, so we questioned several hosting providers and selected the one that would protect our identity the most. At that time, benficagate.info was born.

Several times, during the existence of the twitter accounts, I got data from people that were either whistleblowers or other investigators. But this was through Direct Message on Twitter and as we all know, Social Media is very insecure, no matter how many layers of security you throw at it, so we were trying to find a way for our readers to be able to “blow the whistle” in an anonymous and secure way, so they could protect their identity. A few months later, Tutanota released Secure Connect and we applied for it.

Secure Connect is a very interesting service that can help whistleblowers, authorities and investigators (like us) to receive data from readers. It is something that should be more present, not only in our type of websites, but also in companies, governmental entities and even in media groups, so information can be passed on, without the fear of backlash.

StijnvanGils

I believe that a democracy can only perform well if people are free to express their thoughts, feelings and doubts in a confidential way. Confidential communication gives people enough confidence to reveal scandals and to sharpen their opinion.

As a journalist, I can only write reliable stories if I know what happens in the society. I find it important to offer secure communication to people that provide me information. For this I have now added Secure Connect to my website. Setting up the form itself turned out to be easy. It took around 30 minutes because I wanted to adjust it in my own style.

The encrypted contact form looks simple, and it is easy to use it. However, the need to fill in a new password might also be a bit intimidating. It would be nice if there would be other options as well, e.g. enter an already existing Tutanota email address.


We are happy that journalists are using Secure Connect to offer whistleblowers a secure communication channel.

To add Secure Connect to your website as well, you can easily book Secure Connect. If you have any further questions, please contact our sales team.

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