Microsoft doesn't give NSA direct access to email

Microsoft does not give the National Security Agency direct access to its customers’ email or instant messages, contrary to previous news reports, a company executive said.
News reports last week suggested that Microsoft has helped the NSA circumvent the company’s own encryption in order to conduct surveillance on email accounts through Outlook.com, but company General Counsel Brad Smith said Tuesday that’s not true.
“We do not provide any government with direct access to emails or instant messages,” Smith wrote in a blog post. “Full stop.”
The company does not help government agencies circumvent its encryption, he added. “To be clear, we do not provide any government with the ability to break the encryption, nor do we provide the government with the encryption keys,” he wrote. “When we are legally obligated to comply with [government] demands, we pull the specified content from our servers where it sits in an unencrypted state, and then we provide it to the government agency.”
Microsoft on Tuesday asked U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to permit Microsoft and other communications providers to share “more complete information” about how they handle national security requests for customer information, Smith added.
“We believe the U.S. Constitution guarantees our freedom to share more information with the public, yet the government is stopping us,” he said. The U.S. government has not responded to a June 19 request Microsoft made to publish the number of national security requests it receives, and the company hopes Holder will step in, Smith said.
Microsoft provides government access to data stored in its SkyDrive service and to Skype calls when presented with a legal order to do so, such as a search warrant or national security letter, Smith said. If asked for customer data in enterprise email or document storage, Microsoft attempts to redirect the requesting government agency back to the customer, he said, “and we notify the customer unless we are legally prohibited from doing so.”
Microsoft has never provided any government with customer data from any business or government customers for national security purposes, he said. In 2012, the company complied with four law enforcement requests related to business or government customers, he added.

Microsoft no fan of existing WebRTC standard, proposes its own to get Skype onboard

Microsoft, objecting to a web standard promoted by its competitors? Get out. While Firefox, Opera and now Chrome have implemented WebRTC on some level for plugin-free VoIP and webcam chats, Microsoft doesn't think the existing, proposed standard is up to snuff for linking with existing devices or obeying "key web tenets." It's suggesting a new CU-RTC-Web standard to fix what it claims is broken with WebRTC. Thankfully, the changes are more technical improvements than political maneuvering: Microsoft wants a peer-to-peer transport level that gives more control as well as to reduce some of the requirements that it sees holding the technology back as of today. There's no doubt an economic incentive for a company that wants to push Skype in the browser, but the format is already in front of the W3C and could become a real cross-platform standard. If other W3C members are willing to (slightly) reinvent the wheel, Microsoft's approach could get Chrome and Internet Explorer users talking -- no, really talking.

Outlook vs. Gmail: A Feature-by-Feature Comparison

Microsoft announced its Outlook webmail service this week, and it's a suprisingly robust new webmail client. But can it hold a torch to the current king of webmail, Gmail? To give you a better idea of how they stack up, here's a feature-by-feature comparison of Outlook vs. Gmail.
Feature-by-feature, the two services are remarkably similar. Here's a quick rundown:

Now for the more detailed breakdown.

Interface

Let's start with the first thing you're going to notice when you log into Outlook for the first time: the interface. Most of us are familiar with how Gmail looks and feels. Outlook's not entirely different, but it is a little simpler.

Outlook's Clean, Email-Centric Interface

Outlook is all about email. That's it. When you pop into Outlook, you're shown your email account and nothing else. You still get ads on the sidebar, but overall, it's a far less cluttered interface than Gmail (and it's way less cluttered than Hotmail) because Outlook isn't seeking to integrate with a bunch of other services. Ads are a little less creepy because they're not based on keywords in your inbox.

Gmail's Google-centric Interface

We all know Gmail's interface pretty well at this point. You get personalized ads on the main inbox page on the top, and a sidebar with ads inside your messages. You also have the chat window on the side and the Google bar on the top. It's not complicated by any means, but the Google bar is certainly a bit of a distraction.

Storage Space and Attachments

Email storage space isn't as big of a deal as it once was, but if you're sending a lot of large files back and forth, a hefty amount of storage is helpful.

Outlook Has Nearly Unlimited Storage and a 100MB Limit on Attachments

You get a "virtually unlimited" amount of storage in Outlook. We're not entirely sure what that means, but we do know that you can attach a file of up to 100MB to any email. If you link your email to Skydrive you can attach files up to 300MB.
For incoming attachments, Outlook retains the Hotmail-style Active View. YouTube videos open inside the email, a group of photos becomes a slideshow, and you can open any Office document directly in your browser.

Gmail Comes with 10GB of Storage and a 25MB Limit on Attachments

Gmail's limits on storage and attachment size are a lot smaller than Outlook's. Out of the gates, most Gmail users get 10GB of free storage, and attachments are limited to just 25MB in size.
Like Outlook, Gmail opens up YouTube videos directly inline with the email. Gmail also handles Office documents in a similar way, and opens them in browser with the option to edit in Google Docs. Images in Gmail are handled with a pretty typical list view and don't offer the slick sideshow that Outlook has.

Email Organization

For power-users, the most important part of a good webmail client is automatic email filing and organization. Gmail locked this down a while ago, but Outlook brings some new ideas to the table.

Outlook's Quick View Folders and Sweep Features

Outlook doesn't have the robust filtering and labeling system that Gmail does, but it has a few tricks up its sleeve. One is the Quick View folders. These folders are automatically filled with certain types of emails (flagged, photos, office, shopping, etc). For instance, from the sidebar you can instantly search through the last few messages with photo attachments, or messages about Groupon deals. The Sweep feature from Hotmail also carries over to Outlook. Sweeping works a lot like Gmail's labels where emails from certain people or places automatically get filed away in a folder of your choosing.

Gmail's Filters, Labels, and Priority Messages

Using Gmail's labels is an easy way to keep track which emails are important and where they are. Better still, it's simple to set up an automatic filter that combs your incoming mail and distributes messages directly into those labels. If you're still overwhelmed, the priority inbox is a lifesaver for designating which emails really matter.

Junk Mail Control

Everyone hates spam, and no webmail client is worth using if it doesn't have extensive spam filtering. Of course, it's not just spam, it's also the junk you've signed up for that matters (newsletters, mailing lists, coupons, and whatever else).

Outlook's Spam Control and Clever Batch Filtering

Only time will tell how good Outlook's spam control is, but one of Outlook's coolest features is how it handles newsletter-type messages. Outlook automatically labels these messages and adds an unsubscribe button to them—even if the email doesn't include one its own. It's super handy for filtering out those emails you don't mind getting, but don't want alerts constantly.

Gmail's Spam Control and Filter Settings

Gmail has a pretty great spam filter and chances are you won't have too much trouble with spam. However, it doesn't have the same out-of-the-box batch filtering system for that clutter email you get. Still, it's super easy to set up your own filter for things like newsletters. Just create a new filter with words like, "opt-out, unsubscribe, privacy policy, or manage your account" and all your newsletters and coupons will filter off into their own section.

POP/IMAP Support

If you use a third-party email client on your desktop or mobile device, POP or IMAP support is crucial for keeping everything in order. Support for either also matters when you want to look at email without an active internet connection.

Outlook Doesn't Support IMAP or POP, Instead uses ActiveSync

Here's one of Outlook's major bummers: it doesn't support IMAP or POP. This means using certain third party email services (like Apple's default desktop Mail app) won't work. You can still follow the guide for using Hotmail with POP and that should work with Outlook. Instead, Outlook uses ActiveSync. Subsequently, you can only use email apps that support ActiveSync.

Gmail Has Full Support for Both IMAP and POP

Gmail supports both IMAP and POP and you can switch your settings on the fly very simply. This means you can synchronize between multiple email clients very easily. It also means you can access your archived email even when you're offline.

Search Capabilities

If you receive hundreds of emails a day, then a solid search capability is key with any webmail client. You don't want to spend more than a few minutes hunting down a lost email.

Outlook Has Simple, but Effective Search

Outlook's search capability is pretty straight-forward. You can search by a simple keyword, or pop into the advanced search and narrow it down by email address, subject, folders, and dates. It's nothing too complex, but it works well enough.

Gmail's Comprehensive Advanced Search Strings

Gmail's search strings are pretty advanced. The nice part about Gmail's search is that you don't have to worry about a bunch of input boxes. Instead, you can just type commands like, label, list, or filename, directly into the search box. It's fast and effective for quickly searching through email.

Social Integration

Email is already inherently social, but if you're looking to connect your various social accounts into your email, it's increasingly easy to do.

Outlook's Social Integration with Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn

Outlook directly integrates with Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. When you log in with any of those services, you'll see status updates, link mailbox accounts, and more. From the sidebar you can retweet people on Twitter, comment on Facebook status updates, and more. If you don't like the feature, it's easy enough not to enable.

Gmail's Integrates with Google Plus

Since Gmail is owned by Google, its social integration starts and stops with Google Plus. The two are tied together in a lot ways, including contact listings, email filtering, and more. Provided your friends are using Google Plus, you can even instantly create email groups to send mass messages to.

Which One's Best for You?

Outlook is the newcomer, but it's a no-brainer for anyone currently using Hotmail. It's also a good go-to for anyone who wants a webmail client that only does email. Its simplicity is its greatest strength. That said, Google's integration with all of Google's services is nice, and it's advanced features and customization options are more appealing to the power user.

Five ways to organize your e-mail in Outlook.com

Microsoft's new Outlook.com e-mail offers a number of ways to keep your inbox neat and tidy.

Microsoft yesterday released the preview of its new browser-based e-mail service, Outlook.com. Intended to eventually replace the increasingly antiquated Hotmail, the free service brings a minimalist user interface, social media, and Skydrive integration, and a slew of features. As I said in my First Take, it's a great alternative to Gmail and definitely worth switching to for existing Hotmail or Live.com users. In fact, more than a million users have signed up already.
To be anywhere near useful, an e-mail service should offer plenty of ways to organize your messages. And fortunately, Outlook.com covers all the basics and more. Below I'll discuss five ways to manage your messages and keep your inbox neat and tidy.
1. Instant Actions
When you mouse over an e-mail, three gray icons will appear between the sender's name and the subject field. These "Instant Action" controls let you you delete a message, mark it as unread, or flag it for review (the latter action moves it to the top of your inbox). You can perform the same actions with the Commands bar at the top of the screen, but the Instant Action icons save you a few clicks. What's more, by hiding the icons until you need them, Microsoft keeps the interface clean and free of clutter. If you'd like, you can add more icons from the Settings menu including moving the message to a folder and marking it as junk. Take note, though, that you can see only three icons at one time.

 

Mousing over the sender's name shows a pop-up menu with commands for sending an e-mail to the contact, scheduling a cleanup (see the last step), finding all e-mails from the sender, moving those messages, or deleting them completely. Though officially the menu isn't an "Instant Action" feature, it's another way to organize a message without using the Commands bar.

 

2. Folders and Quick View categories
Outlook.com's Folders feature is similar to that on other popular e-mail services. When you move a file to a folder it removes it from the inbox, just like if you took a paper file from your desk and stored it in a drawer. You can add e-mails to a folder through drag and drop or by selecting the e-mail and using the Move to pull-down menu from the Commands bar. Default folders include Junk, Sent, and Drafts, but you can create as many folders as you'd like.

 

Categories work differently. Instead of acting as separate folders, categories are ways to classify messages by their content. So even when you assign a message to category it will remain in your inbox. Clicking on a category, though, shows only the messages assigned to it.
Microsoft has added default categories for messages with attachments and those with a shipping tracking number. When those messages arrive, Outlook.com will detect them and automatically tag them with the appropriate category. Like with Folders, you can create your own categories, though you can assign categories only by selecting the message and using the pull-down menu from the Commands bar. Drag and drop is not an option.

 

3. Rules and filters
As with Gmail, you can create rules based on the sender's name or address, the "To" or "CC" field, the Subject field, or whether the message has attachments. Then, you can tell Outlook.com to automatically move them to a folder, flag them in your inbox, forward them to a new e-mail address, add or remove a category, or delete them completely. To access the Rules menu, click on the Sweep menu in the Commands bar and choose Manage rules.

 

You can manage your incoming messages by sender under the Safe and blocked senders option of the Settings menu. The options include designating which senders are "safe" (so the messages aren't marked as junk), which mailing lists are safe, and which senders should be blocked completely. E-mails from a sender in your blocked list will be deleted.

 

4. Junk e-mails
Use an e-mail account long enough and spam will begin to trickle in. And before long it can become a flood. As it should, Outlook.com offers a few tools for junk mail management, the first of which is accessible from the Commands bar. Clicking the Junk option will reveal choices for marking the message as Junk, reporting a phishing scam, or alerting Microsoft if you suspect that a friend's account has been hacked. If you mark a message as junk accidentally, you can reverse the action in your Junk folder. That's a necessary feature since future messages from that sender will be deleted.

 

In the Settings menu there are more tools for Junk e-mail management. Just click the Filters and reporting option to set junk mail filters, decide whether you'd like to report junk mail to Microsoft, or block content from all unknown senders.

 

5. Sweep and schedule cleanup
Though no broom is involved, you can sweep your inbox using the pull-down menu on the Commands bar. Here you can move all messages from a sender or delete them as a group.

 

Under the same menu, the Schedule cleanup feature brings additional options such as keeping only the recent messages from a sender or deleting anything older than 3, 10, 30, or 60 days. Or if you prefer, you can move the older messages to a specific folder.

1 million users sign up for Outlook.com in six hours

More than 1 million people are now using the new Outlook.com, Hotmail's successor, after Microsoft tweets the service's statistics after just six hours.

Outlook.com has seen more than 1 million people sign up for the service in just a few hours, Microsoft has said.
The sign-up figures for the successor to Hotmail were tweeted by @Outlook yesterday just over six hours after the new service was first announced.

Microsoft's figures on Outlook.com signups

The changes include the new email address -- @outlook.com -- which will replace the older @hotmail.com address, used by hundreds of millions worldwide across its more than 10 years of its service. Users can already "Upgrade to Outlook.com" to keep their existing address.
The new Web-based email service will eventually integrate Skype, delivering a new rival to Gmail-embedded Google's Talk service. Microsoft acquired Skype for $8.5 billion last year following European regulators signing off on the deal.
But the real measure of success will be if existing Hotmail users voluntarily make the jump to Outlook.com of their own accord: the software giant still has to hope it can generate enough buzz around the new service to prevent a mass exodus to rival services, such as Google's Gmail.
Google remains in the lead with 425 million users, while Hotmail has approximately more than 350 million at the last count.

Outlook.com replaces Hotmail, breaks Windows Phone services

Software

Microsoft has a new email service -- Outlook.com has launched, and will eventually replace popular browser-based service Hotmail.
Outlook.com borrows the clean Metro-infused look that's already present on its mobile platform and is about to go mainstream with Windows 8. As Microsoft explains on its official blog, if you already have a Live or Hotmail account you can sign in using that, and if you want, you can change your existing email address to one ending in outlook.com.
Windows Phone users should hold fire on this, however -- while many Microsoft employees enthusiasts will be keen to change their existing address to a new one, when you go to make the switch, the Powerpoint-addled corporation warns, "On your phone, features that use this address will stop working, including Marketplace, Xbox LIVE, SkyDrive, email and others.
"To use these features again on your phone," Microsoft continues, "you'd need to restore it to factory settings, which erases all personal content."
In other words, despite Windows Phone being Microsoft's own operating system, changing your phone's Microsoft-brand email address to an Outlook.com one will bork several major apps.
Dismaying stuff, especially for Windows Phone enthusiasts. A question also hangs over whether Microsoft will be able to keep its new toy free of spam -- the service currently prompts new users to verify their humanity using a nigh-on unreadable captcha code, with a broken audio tip that, as ZDNet's Rupert Goodwins points out, sounds like being trapped down a well with an experimental yodeler and his synth keyboard.
So, a few teething problems, but with the official Twitter account raving that the service has already attracted 1 million sign-ups, Outlook.com could eventually prove a decent Gmail alternative for those who are into Microsoft's other services, like Skydrive or Windows Phone. You can also add contacts from social networks, including Facebook.
Microsoft has (optimistically) provided step-by-step instructions for those who want to switch from Gmail to the new service, so examine this page if you're looking to make the jump. Hotmail will eventually be replaced completely by Outlook.com.

Microsoft introduces Outlook.com, Hotmail's planned successor

Back in June, there were leaks about an alleged new Microsoft mail client -- "Newmail" -- something LiveSide.net described as a Metro-style Hotmail."

On July 31, Microsoft took the wraps off a preview version of that new client, which it is formally christening "Outlook.com." (The screen shot above is an example of what the new Outlook.com interface looks like.)

Microsoft is billing Outlook.com as a new free mail service that pulls features from Hotmail and Exchange. It is designed for personal/consumer use; Microsoft continues to position Outlook as its business e-mail client. Outlook.com is integrated with Windows and Office, and can pull in Twitter, Facebook, Gmail and LinkedIn contacts. The new mail client has the Metro look and feel. And it is providing users with more granular control over which ads they see and where they see them.

In some countries, @Hotmail email addresses are not pariahs. But in others, they're considered as unhip as @aol addresses. While Microsoft is not currently requiring Hotmail users to move to Outlook.com, the longer-term plan is to convince them to move to Outlook.com. There's no word on when (or definitively if) Microsoft will pull the plug on Hotmail.com, but I'd guess there is a date on someone's calendar at Microsoft as to when this will happen.

Those who've been following the increasingly regular feature updates that the Hotmail team has added to the service will be familiar with Outlook.com's features. The ability to view previews of attached photos; to "sweep" unwanted messages in bulk; to weed out "gray" (junk) mail more easily; and to access Microsoft's Office Web Apps (the Webified versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote) from inside mail are all part of Outlook.com. (I'm not really sure which unique Exchange features are part of Outlook.com. Anyone?)

Microsoft is providing new Outlook.com users with 7 GB of free cloud storage through SkyDrive. (If you already have a SkyDrive account, I don't believe you get an extra 7 GB added to your total available storage if you sign up for Outlook.com, however.) As it has been doing with Hotmail, Microsoft is trying to wean Outlook.com users from sending attachments. Instead, the focus is on saving files, photos and other content to the cloud, with "smart layouts" in email messages showing recipients what they can see via links and/or downloads.

On Windows devices, including Windows 8 and Windows RT tablets and PCs, users will have the option of choosing which mail client they want to use (when they click on the Mail app). One of the permitted choices will be Outlook.com. And on other mobile devices and phones -- not just Windows Phones, but any phone that supports Exchange ActiveSync -- Outlook.com will be a supported mail option, as well.

For those wondering about Skype integration, especially given this week's news regarding Google replacing Gmail video chat with Google+ Hangouts, Microsoft is dangling the promise of, at some point in the future, being able to launch Skype video calls from inside Outlook.com inboxes without having to use the Skype app. (It sounds like the ability to use Outloo.com plus video calling from the Web will be another option here.)

Microsoft is not commenting on when it expects Outlook.com will advance beyond the test stage. As of today, it is available in preview form. Those who already have @hotmail.com and/or @live.com email addresses that they want to move to @outlook.com can click "Upgrade to Outlook.com" in the options menu. Those who do not have existing Microsoft consumer mail accounts with those addresses can sign up for a new @outlook.com email address via www.outlook.com.