Bitcoin Forum

I was wondering if there was an P2P Email technology? If so, could you suggest it (or one of them) to me for investigation. If not, is there a reason why this can't work? Or, is there a reason that one would not want to use such a technology?

Email is already peer-to-peer. Using my SMTP server, I can send and receive email to/from anyone without relying on third-parties. I could even send email using telnet if I wanted -- the basic protocol is (unsurprisingly) simple.

ther is a p2p email program running on i2p, cant remember what its called

I agree with theymos.  eMail is already peer-to-peer, since anyone can install a mail server.

However, it's a bit difficult technically, and it's kind of useless if you don't own a fixed IP and a domain name.

I must disagree, theymos. A P2P system does not have servers. Instead it has a network of nodes that each as as important as any other node. A email server interacts with clients by hosting and/or routing all of the mail for the clients. In order for email to be p2p there would need to be no servers, only a network in which every node hosted a share of the required workload and a share of the disk space. The benefits of this system is that if a single node went down the network could have enough redundancy for there to be no issue. In a server based system like current email if the server goes down then there is no way for the network to function. Of course, storage of messages would need to be encrypted like any P2P storage network.

Thank you, Nefario. I will look into that i2p email program. Perhaps it will be what I am looking for.

The application isi2p bote.

But just on what you said about p2p not having servers is you're wrong. All p2p services, networks whatever work on a client server basis, the difference being that every client also has as  a server, each node can act at any time as both a client and server.

Email is perfectly capable of operating in this manner. If everyone ran their own SMTP server, then it would be "fully" P2P. However, most people prefer to use a centralized service. The system is still P2P, though, since it's entirely possible for two people to communicate directly.

In the future most Bitcoin users will transact through MyBitcoin-like services, and running a full network node will require gigabit-speed Internet access. Does that make Bitcoin non-P2P?


If one SMTP server goes down, then the rest of the network functions just fine. Mail will even be delivered after the server comes back up, since other peers will keep trying to deliver mail for several days.

FreeMail is an in-freenet mail. Also i2p provides something.
Also there is mixmaster network: http://sourceforge.net/projects/mixmaster/

In either way, use OpenPGP in e-mails (e.g. thunderbird, or kmail)

Now, if someone could just come up with a P2P e-mail technology based on a cryptographic reputation system that effectively kept out spammers, but still had appropriate controls on things like robo-mails, mailing lists, and anonymous e-mail users (all of which serve useful purposes when not abused), then we'd have something good.

The proof-of-work system which Bitcoin mining depends on was originally intended for email. Email can carry any data, so you can just encrypt your messages manually.

I own p2pmail.com if thats worth anything lol

I purchased it when they announced p2pdns   :D

Now all we need is a proposal to overload the block chain to hold email, and the circle will be complete.

haha I see what you did there.  :D