Frequently asked questions

Can Librem One work on Android and iOS?
Yes it works and is available in Android Play Store and Apple App Store
Why do I need to pay?
We are changing the landscape of digital rights, which includes changing the business model from the previous exploitative zero-price for all-your-data, to a nominal-price to retain your digital rights, data, and privacy.
Can I get a free Librem One account?
Since not everybody can afford to pay, we do offer a free Librem One Basic account if you agree to strictly avoid products and services from big-tech that exploit you, lock you in, and control your data. If you agree to that, select the ‘FREE’ option for Librem One Basic: Social + Chat service, and you can get a free account as a gesture of gratitude from Purism, SPC.
Can I communicate to people on other services?
Yes! Librem One uses open standards, free software, and decentralized protocols for all our services; similar to email, you can communicate to anybody using the same protocols for chat, email, and social, this allows you to communicate across different domains.
How do I delete Facebook, Whatsapp, and Instagram and switch to Librem One?
Each of these services, all owned by Facebook, has a different set of steps for deletion. To delete your Facebook account, see the Facebook or WikiHow guide. To delete your Instagram account see the Instagram or WikiHow guide. To delete your Whatsapp account, see the WhatsApp or WikiHow guide. Then sign up here!
How do I delete Twitter and switch to Librem One?
See the Twitter or WikiHow guide to delete your account. Then sign up here!
How do I delete G+ and switch to Librem One?
Google Plus shut down on April 2nd 2019. You can still check the Google or WikiHow guide to make sure your account is gone. Then sign up here!
How do I delete Gmail and switch to Librem One?
To delete your Gmail account, see the Google or WikiHow guide. Then sign up here!
How can I get Librem One that is integrated into Librem laptops or the Librem 5 phone?
Currently you will install and setup the applications individually, in the future you will be able to just sign-up and then log-in during initial product setup and have all the services available by default.
Can I buy this for my friend or family?
Yes, you can buy an individual account or a Family Pack, and then download the bundle and have the persons sign-in using the account you created.
I live in a different country, can I buy and use Librem One?
Yes, we accept many forms of payment and even offer a free basic service, Librem One has no restrictions on geolocation or country, if your country has rules or regulations that limit service it is not due to Librem One restrictions.
Can legal requests from authorities see my data?
Public (Librem Social) is publicly visible to everybody. Private end-to-end encrypted data (chat, email, tunnel) is only visible to you and the intended recipient(s). If something is not Public and not Private, it is Temporary (unencrypted direct messages, unencrypted email) and is removed within 30 days. Any valid legal request for data is complied with.
How much mail can I store? How many images can I post?
Basic tier users have a 1 GiB storage quota across all services. Complete tier users have a 2 GiB quota. If you exceed your quota, your oldest messages/posts will be deleted, until you are within quota again.
Can I purchase additional storage?
Once Librem Files and Librem Backup are released, you will be able to opt-in to a pay-as-you-go storage plan.
How much traffic can go through my tunnel?
You can tunnel unlimited traffic from up to 10 devices.
How do I report illegal content?
Any illegal content or illegal acts should be reported to the appropriate authorities who are equipped to handle it.
But if you’re successful, won’t you become just like Big Tech and lock-me-in or spy-on-me?
No, we are a Social Purpose Corporation, which means we are bound by our articles of incorporation that clearly state we cannot exploit people and that we must put doing social good over maximizing profit.
Why can’t my username contain a dot, underscore, accents, non-roman letters or emoji?
Your username needs to be valid across multiple existing and future protocols and services. So we permit only the “lowest common denominator”.
Note that most clients let you set your “display name” to anything you want.
Why can’t I have a different username for Mail and Social?
You can do this with two accounts. For example, register basic@librem.one for chat and social posts, and register complete@librem.one for mail and tunnel services.
Multiple accounts also allow you to implement a separation of concerns. For example, you could have a business account, and a separate account when discussing a medical condition with your support network.
To protect your privacy, we do not store a mapping between accounts, except in the case of family packs where one user is financially responsible for multiple accounts.
Why doesn’t Librem Tunnel work?
Please confirm that you have subscribed to a Complete or Family Pack account. Then visit your profile page to activate your tunnel connection. Once you have done this your Librem Tunnel client will work.
Why doesn’t Librem Mail work?
Please confirm that you have subscribed to a Complete or Family Pack account.
Can I send and receive encrypted mail on my Apple device?
On the macOS desktop you can use Thunderbird to encrypt email with OpenPGP. Read the EFF’s how-to on PGP for macOS
There is no free software solution for OpenPGP on iOS today. You can still send and receive temporary messages from the Mail app.
With enough backers, we will build a solution! (See our stretch goals!)
What details do I need to set up Librem Mail in the iOS Mail app?
Follow the steps from Apple to Set up your email account manually with the following details:
Account type: IMAP
Host name: imap.librem.one
Outgoing mail server: smtp.librem.one
Why is configuring Librem Mail in the iOS Mail app so hard?
Librem Mail is a new email provider. Our server details are not yet recorded by Apple and unlike other clients, the Mail app doesn’t perform this lookup automatically.
Will you release your apps on F-Droid?
Yes! In the meantime, any app that speaks our open protocols will work. We recommend:
Riot for chat, Tusky for social and K-9 Mail for mail.
Where can I find other compatible apps, including desktop clients?
The following guides and lists will help:
Chat. See the Matrix Clients Matrix.
Mail. See the FSF’s Email Self-Defense guide. Send an encrypted email to Edward!
Social. See the Mastodon apps page.
Tunnel. See Liberty CLI our command-line tool with tunnel support. Contributions welcome!