New video conferencing feature in the mailbox.org Office

• Ideal for families and small businesses with up to 10 participants per session
• Encrypted connections and unlimited session duration
• „mailbox.org video conference“ included in the basic € 1 price plan until the end of 2020

Secure video conferences, hosted in Germany, easy to use, and inexpensive: We are very pleased to announce this new feature as part of the mailbox.org Office, which is available to our private customers as well as team accounts. By integrating secure video conferencing into our service portfolio, we are making the next step towards providing a comprehensive communication platform.

The feature is based on a further development of the open-source software „Jitsi“ and regularly available for all but the most basic of our mail packages. However, in light of the Covid pandemic, we made the new feature also available in our basic €1-per-month “Secure Mail” plan until the end of the year.

mailbox.org runs all the required servers, in data centers that are located in Germany. This is how we can guarantee that any personal data about you, your family members, or your staff will be kept secure and compliant with data protection laws, with a trustworthy provider in Germany. None of the data is being stored or analyzed by American companies, which is important in light of a recent judicial decision by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) that declared the so-called „US-Privacy Shield“ mechanism invalid, rendering the use of most US-based cloud services in Europe unlawful from a data protection perspective. Please read our interview on the ECJ decision about the US Privacy Shield (in German).

Video conferences - secure and easy to use

All connections to mailbox.org video conferences are encrypted. The feature can be used easily and intuitively, especially also by less technically-minded people. Users can set up virtual conference rooms in their mailbox.org Office and assign a room name and a password, if desired. Participants receive their invitation links by e-mail.

Being secure and easy to use, our new video conferencing feature is not only interesting for businesses, small teams, and training sessions, but also for private use, also considering that due to the Corona pandemic, it can be difficult for friends and family to meet in person. For the time being, there is a limit of 10 participants per conference session.

mailbox.org can offer dedicated, closed video conferencing systems to large organizations. These systems allow sessions with more than 100 participants. If you are interested in such a solution, please get in touch: business-support@mailbox.org

Participants require only a regular web browser to attend (We recommend Firefox or Chrome) – no additional software is required. As an alternative, participants can use the service on mobile devices. There are free apps available for Google Android and Apple iOS.

In addition to the core video conferencing functionality, it is also possible to communicate via chat or share one's screen or presentations slides during a session.

mailbox.org video conference – the features:

• Runs in the Web browser, no further software installation necessary
• Invite links are sent by e-mail
• Up to 10 participants per session
• Unlimited session duration
• Share your screen and show presentation slides
• Text-based chat with moderation features
• Participant management, such as the muting of individual attendees
• Securely encrypted connections

Prices and availability

mailbox.org video conferencing is available now in our price plans starting with „Team-Mail“ (EUR 2,50 per month and user), which includes 5 GB Mail storage, 25 aliases, and further team- and groupware features.

To support our users in times of COVID-19, video conferences are currently also available in the basic “Secure Mail” package (EUR 1 per month), up until 31 December 2020.

Over the first few weeks of running the service, we will be monitoring general usage to gather more experience about the extent to which video conferencing is used by our customers. This is necessary to enable us to optimally provision and scale the computing capacity that is required for videoconferencing. The service will start in a beta phase at first. As we gain more experience, we will be able to adapt and expand the offer in the medium term.

Further information

In our knowledge base you will find further information as well as a number of FAQs about video conferencing at mailbox.org.