Security News > 2020 > December > Court orders encrypted email biz Tutanota to build a backdoor in user's mailbox, founder says 'this is absurd'

Tutanota has been served with a court order to backdoor its encrypted email service - a situation founder Matthias Pfau described to The Register as "Absurd."

Our friends at Heise reported auf Deutsch that a court in Germany last month ordered Tutanota to help investigators monitor the contents of a user's encrypted mailbox.

We imagine Tutanota could alter its code to capture a copy of the user's password during login so that someone else can unlock it later, though it's not clear if the court order goes this far.

In any case, if the user never logs in again, the mailbox contents will remain enciphered, and the court order can't be fulfilled.

Pfau also added that in June the Hannover Regional Court had struck down a lower district court's ruling that Tutanota was to be backdoored.

News URL

https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2020/12/08/tutanota_backdoor_court_order/