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CryptoHeaven Available For Mac OS X

Posted by pudge on from the but-think-of-the-terrorists dept.

Mark0 writes "In an article on MacCentral we read 'CryptoHeaven beefs up Mac OS X support'. This is great news for the Mac OS X community as there aren't many competing applications for the new platform. CryptoHeaven seems to be leading the secure email sector and also provides instant messaging and file storage!" You can never have too much security! Well, OK, you can, but CryptoHeaven looks kinda neat.

20 comments

  1. An excellent product by Blind+Linux · · Score: 2, Informative

    Wow... Cryptoheaven sure is great. Now I don't have to mess around with OS X Mail client, or use bad Mac ports of Windows IM products.
    I believe there's a huge market for a product like this.
    On another note, doing some research, I found that there were several interesting ways of achieving secure e-mail connections in OS X.

  2. Another option... by Quicksilver31337 · · Score: 5, Informative

    For those that are happy with the Apple Mail client then their is another popular crypto solution to protect your privacy. PGP, you know it, it is available in the form of GPG (the GNU Privacy Guard) and there is currently a rather well developed set of tools for Mac OS X (Here.) Including the GPG base, and addons to Mail.app so u can easily encrypt and decrypt your mail using the wide PGP standard.

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    _______
    Death wish, n.:

    The only wish that always comes true, whether or not one wishes it t
    1. Re:Another option... by tbmaddux · · Score: 4, Informative
      GPG covers the email. For files, there is also PuzzlePalace which provides a GUI front-end to OpenSSL (included in MacOS X). $15 shareware but it won't nag you. While you're there, get a copy of BrickHouse and turn on your firewall.

      Or you can just use Apple's Disk Copy to create AES-encrypted and password-protected disk volumes. Just be sure not to put the password in your Keychain (it's selected to do that by default when it prompts for a password at mount). It's free and already installed with MacOS X.

      --
      Can't you see that everyone is buying station wagons?
    2. Re:Another option... by BitGeek · · Score: 2



      Right, because if you put it in your keychain, then its only protected by an easy to guess single password, right?

      Has anyone tried making the keychain itself better protected? (Say, putting IT on an AES partition) or putting it on a removable USB keychain drive?

      (And then encrypting it with PGP or something.)

      I've considered doing this, but haven't had a chance to experiment -- I wonder if OS X can handle the keychain being somewhere other than ~/Library/Keychain, like /Volumes/Toyota/?

      --
      Yeah, and you guys panned the ipod too: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23/ 1816257
    3. Re:Another option... by panck · · Score: 1
      I use GPG for encrypting files as well.

      for example
      gpg -ear me@myaddr.com < private.file >private.asc
      This encrypts (e) the file to me (r "receiver", specified by the email address) and saves it in ascii text format (a). Later if I want to decrypt (d) the file:
      gpg -d private.asc
      (then enter passphrase)

      pretty simple

      as for a GUI solution...? I think it would be simple to make some system services or applescripts or something to wrap that functionality, but i dunno
      --
      "What thou shalt not, I shalt did!" -Bart Simpson
    4. Re:Another option... by anarkhos · · Score: 1

      Does GPG use a framework bundle yet, or is it still suck in /usr?

      A framework is a lot easier to manage especially since I can put it in my own ~/Library/Frameworks/

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      >80 column hard wrapped e-mail is not a sign of intelligent
      >life
    5. Re:Another option... by Cadre · · Score: 2

      There is a GPGME Framework (GPGME being the preferred way to access the functionality of GPG).

      Point your browser to http://macgpg.sourceforge.net/ and download the GPGME.Framework.

      --
      All editorial writers ever do is come down from the hill after the battle is over and shoot the wounded.
    6. Re:Another option... by anarkhos · · Score: 1

      "access the functionality of"?!

      So it's just a shim? That defeats the whole point |-p

      Also, when the hell is GPG going to use CDSA, multiple keychains suck

      --
      >80 column hard wrapped e-mail is not a sign of intelligent
      >life
    7. Re:Another option... by Cadre · · Score: 2
      So it's just a shim? That defeats the whole point

      It's supposed to be a shim. It provides all the APIs and everything you'd want (encryption, decryption, signing, signature verification and key management) and the engine (being GPG) could easily be swapped out for something else. If you don't like it though, take it up with Werner. The argument of whether or not the functions should be directly accessible via a library have been argued to death in the various newsgroups/mailing lists...

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      All editorial writers ever do is come down from the hill after the battle is over and shoot the wounded.
    8. Re:Another option... by anarkhos · · Score: 1

      That pretty much kills any interest I could have had with GPG.

      OS X has a trust framework which ought to be used or else it's just a 5th wheel. If I wanted Linux chaos I would use it.

      --
      >80 column hard wrapped e-mail is not a sign of intelligent
      >life
  3. I've had it for a week now... by arson1 · · Score: 4, Informative

    And I've been pleasantly suprised by the nice set of features, and the speed... especially considering the fact that it is a Java application.

    File transfer/encryption is a one click process, my only complaint is that I only get 2MB of storage for free... you can pay for more though

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    --
    Don't sweat the petty things, and don't pet the sweaty things.
    1. Re:I've had it for a week now... by b_pretender · · Score: 4, Insightful
      From the article: "You can never have too much security!"

      I don't know if this is true or not. I know that the proper amount of security is such that the expense of breaking the encryption is greater than the value of the message for every point in the future. This doesn't have an upper bound. The only factor that comes into play is convenience of the security procedures. Too much security sometimes relates to an inconvenient policies.

  4. Subscription costs! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful
    Yeah, crypto to be safe... as long as I keep paying the "$2.42/mo ... less than a cup of coffee a week!"

    And what will I do with all my secure data once Cryptoheaven dot bombs itself?

    1. Re:Subscription costs! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Look at the rate that they release new versions and updates ... there is a new version or update available quite often,.... as long as that is the case I am comfortable trusting my data to them. If they ever stop updating the software, then I'll start to worry about it. But for now I think they are OK.

  5. I"m still waiting for a better SMTP. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Why cant someone make a better client so all the spam can be stopped (or significantly slowed down).

    1. Re:I"m still waiting for a better SMTP. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      With CryptoHeaven, there is no spam because you can limit your incoming mail strictly to your contact list. No other random people can send you email if they don't request a contact first. This setting can be turned off/on for email comming from CryptoHeaven members and for external email separately.

  6. I really like CryptoHeaven by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This APP rocks!!! I've been looking around for an app like that for a long time! There is nothing like it. Pure user friendlynes with the power of encryption. Go guys!

    I just started using CryptoHeaven and me and my friends already setup a securely shared folder to collaborate on work project. The setup didn't take more than 5 minutes and thats including account creating etc. Overall the design and interface is well build and is very intuitive. The multi user chat comes handy too! I would recommend this app to anyone as a secure groupware.

  7. Very unique software by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Very, very uniques software. To my knowledge this is the only software/service that combines email, messaging and online storge in a SECURE environment. They offer something much, much more secure then the more popular SSL "security." Every new version brings in something new, and this is no exception.