5 Ways to Send Completely Anonymous Emails

Sometimes you need to send an anonymous email—whether it’s a heartfelt confession or sharing information without revealing your identity. There are plenty of legitimate reasons to use anonymous email. You can use free services or a temporary account combined with a VPN. Here are five effective methods.

1. Temporary Email and VPN

Services like Gmail can be used for anonymous emailing since you don’t have to provide personal information during registration. The address you create can be used whenever you need to send an anonymous message.

When you send an email from Gmail, the sender’s address in the email header shows Google’s server, not your personal IP address, which increases your anonymity. If the recipient tries to trace the sender via the header, they’ll only see Google’s server IP, which may not be anywhere near your actual location.

However, traces still remain, as your real IP address is stored on the mail servers. If the government or other authorities with the proper authority make a request, Google can provide your real IP address.

The next step to increase anonymity is to use a Virtual Private Network (VPN). We recommend reputable paid VPN services.

• The mail server’s address won’t match your actual location.
• If the government makes a request, Google can only provide the VPN’s IP address.

This is why it’s especially important to use a trustworthy VPN service that doesn’t keep connection logs. Free VPNs are much more likely to store and share logs.

Note: Don’t confuse a temporary anonymous address with a disposable email.

2. Email Client with VPN

The second method is to use an email client installed on your computer. Anonymity is achieved in three steps:

1. Register a temporary address with services like Gmail, Yahoo Mail, or GMX.
2. Install Thunderbird or another free email client.
3. Connect to a VPN.

First, connect to your VPN and make sure all your computer’s traffic is routed through the remote IP address. Then, send your email using the client and the temporary address. This way, the email header will show the VPN’s IP address instead of your own.

3. AnonEmail

AnonEmail is a service that lets you send anonymous emails through a chain of random nodes, making it nearly impossible to trace the sender’s IP address.

It’s easy to use: just enter the recipient, subject, message, and click “Send Anonymously.” Unlike some similar services, AnonEmail does not (or claims not to) store your IP address. In testing, it was not possible to trace the sender’s IP, but it’s still not recommended to send anything important or illegal.

As an extra security measure, AnonEmail waits a while before sending your message, so the time of sending can’t be used to determine your location or time zone.

4. Cyber Atlantis

Cyber Atlantis is another free service for sending anonymous emails that hides the sender’s IP address and supports PGP encryption.

This increases security, since only the owner of the public key can decrypt the message (using their private key). However, using public key encryption can have unintended consequences. For example, if only a small group has the encryption key, the recipient might try to figure out who sent the message.

5. ProtonMail

If you need a fully secure, anonymous, two-way email service, ProtonMail is your best bet. Used by millions, ProtonMail has been providing secure email services for years.

Some key features include:

• End-to-end encryption: All stored messages are encrypted, not just those sent from ProtonMail servers. Without access to the ProtonMail account, no one can read your messages.
• Complete user data protection: The encryption key is stored only on your computer. Even ProtonMail’s system administrators can’t access your messages. The downside: admins can’t recover your account if you lose access. The upside: your data can’t be handed over to authorities or anyone else.
• Open-source cryptography: ProtonMail uses open-source encryption libraries, so you can be sure there are no backdoors for admins or hackers.

If you regularly send anonymous emails, consider using ProtonMail as your main address.

Which Service Is Best?

The answer depends on your needs. If you want ongoing anonymity and security, ProtonMail is a great choice, since even the service’s administrators can’t access your emails. If you only need to send anonymous emails occasionally, use one of the free web services.