Has anyone ever paid cash for Tuta? If yes, what's been your experience?

Privacy Questions
1

I want to upgrade to a paid Tuta Revolutionary account. And I want to do it anonymously. For me, paying cash is the easiest option.

HOW IT WORKS

To my understanding, the way this is achieved is that you buy a Tuta gift card from one of their partners and authorized resellers (the Proxy Store), and you pay for it with cash.

You put the cash in an envelope with a note and the order number, and send it to their address in Germany via registered mail. Once received, you’ll get a notification via e-mail.

QUESTIONS:

1) Has anyone ever done this from outside Germany? If yes, what’s been your experience?

2) Can I send the cash via DHL or FedEx?

3) Does the cash have to be from the country the parcel is being sent from? In other words, if I live in Singapore, can I send euros or US dollars if I have those currencies in cash?

4) Does my real name and address have to appear on the parcel? The Proxy store says that they destroy the envelope once it arrives, and I trust that they do. But I’d rather not write my real details.

5) a) Are gift cards geo-locked?

The Proxy Store accepts 20 FIAT currencies in cash and asks you to declare which country you live in for their own tax purposes. I’m guessing you don’t have to be honest about that, but I’m not sure. I’d like confirmation.

Tuta’s ToS for gift cards says:

a gift card is valid to be redeemed in the country specified by the purchaser in the acquisition process .

b) If I declared I live in Luxembourg but happened to be on holiday in Venezuela when I send euros in cash, will I be able to redeem my gift card?

c) What about the exact same scenario as b), except I send US dollars instead of euros?

d) Whatever the country/currency scenario is, will my Tuta account be tied to a specific country?

Although I don’t plan to do this, I want to be able to send different accepted currencies in cash and declare a different country of residence every time.

Meaning, I want to be allowed to send Australian dollars for my first gift card, and say I live in Japan. Then for my second gift card, send US dollars and say I live in France. And I want to use these gift cards for the same account.

Also, if I’m paying in euros, it shouldn’t matter which EU country I say I’m from. People in the EU move countries all the time.

Tuta charges exclusively in euros, and the price is the same regardless of users’ location, so it would be stupid to geo lock gift cards.

5) Are Tuta’s ToS even up to date?

It says that the only payment methods they accept for gift card are credit cards and PayPal. Neither PayPal or credit cards are listed as a payment option for Tuta on the Proxy Store, which is the only store they recommend.

I appreciate your feedback.

2

Personally I haven’t but lots of people pay cash for other services like Mullvad and I heard it works great. If you write a joke on the envelope they might give you free stuff!

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3

I never understood the concept of sending cash by mail , why not just pay with XMR (while connected to Tor) ?

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4

Cash is easier to get, and hard to trace. Cash is still the number 1 anonymous payment system in terms of number of transactions and dollar amount.

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5

Exactly! I didn’t even know one could pay anonymously for Tuta with cash until I saw someone mention it in a comment months ago. All I knew was that it was possible to pay anonymously with Monero.

I’M A NEWBIE TO CRYPTO

However, I have never used Monero, and I have never used crypto in my life. I think learning to buy, manage and spend crypto would be challenging for me as I’m a total newbie.

I asked Tuta how I could pay with Monero, and they informed me that they don’t accept direct payments via Monero, but that I could buy a Tuta gift card via the Proxy Store with Monero. This doesn’t alter the fact that I still don’t know how to buy Monero, and that Tuta gave me no directions on how to buy Monero.

CASH IS EASIER

When Tuta said that cash was also an option, I realized it was the best option for me. Because it’s easier, though not necessarily cheaper.

PROTON HAS NO EXCUSE

They should follow Tuta’s example

If this works, if I am able to pay for a Tuta account anonymously with cash, then Proton has no excuse to no not offer the same. When I first heard Andy Yen’s arguments for why they don’t accept Monero as payment method, it made complete sense, and frankly, it still does.

As I mentioned earlier, Tuta also doesn’t accept Monero as payment method. I thought they did. But they actually don’t. However, Tuta sells gift cards, that you can buy via the Proxy Store, their online store partner, and that partner not only accepts Monero, but also cash.

Simple Login is on the Proxy Store!

IMHO, there is no reason why Proton can’t do the same thing. In fact, they already do, to some degree. The Proxy store sells gift cards for various kinds of online services, from different companies, including MullvadVPN, but also, to my surprise, Simple Login!

Although I could be wrong, I suspect that the option to pay for Simple Login anonymously via the Proxy Store predates Proton acquiring them. If Simple Login still sells gift cards via the Proxy Store, Proton can do the same withe the rest of their services.

It bothers me that a paid Proton user is afforded less privacy than a free user, because their payment information is tied to their account, forever.

They wouldn’t be directly tied to Monero

Proton doesn’t accept Monero because it’s too risky for their reputation. Monero is somewhat in legal limbo, some people have gone to jail, so I completely understand why Proton doesn’t want to be among the first “mainstream” companies to accept it as payment.

Following Tuta and Mullvad’s example with the Proxy Store, is not that. They could still publicly say they don’t accept Monero because they wouldn’t.

Cash payments is still an option

And even if Proton has reservations about being indirectly tied to Monero via the Proxy Store, they could still negotiate an agreement with them so that Proton gift cards can only be bought with cash. But the fact that Simple Login vouchers can be bought with Monero and cash via the Proxy suggests the same can be done for other Proton services. Ths is why, IMHO, Proton has no excuse.

Conclusion

I don’t know how long Tuta and Simple login have been partnering with the Proxy Store, but if it’s been a couple of years, that tells me Proton could have done the same instead of developing their own bitcoin wallet. I have nothing against the latter, but if privacy is Proton’s priority, anonymous payments for existing services should have comes first. Especially if it’a little to no risk to their reputations and business.

6

That sounds awesome! As I mentioned in a different comment, MullvadVPN is also available on the Proxy Store.

Although marketing can be deceptive, and often is to some degree, I appreciate that Mullvad puts out huge billboards in cities to raise awareness and demonstrate its commitment to privacy.

Although I have never used MullvadVPN, I did consider them as an option, and I visited their website. When you browse their website, and look at how they set up the architecture of their service, it is clear that they are very serious about privacy.

Most VPN providers, who use privacy as a selling point, do not show that level of commitment. Even Proton VPN, which is on the very short list of recommended VPNs by the privacy community, does not show the level of commitment that Mullvad does, IMHO.

To be specific, I’m not suggesting that Proton as a company is not serious about privacy. I think they absolutely are, and examples of their advocacy is legion. But the fact Proton has been around for 10 years and has yet to offer the option to pay anonymously is extremely disappointing.

7

Install Monero.com wallet, buy Monero inside the wallet itself, use Monero.

It’s a lot easier than you think.

8

Never heard of Monero.com or Cake Wallet. I just briefly visited the site you linked, and indeed it seems, super easy. Honesty, it looks extremely promising! However, I have 2 questions.

1) How is my privacy protected if I buy Monero with FIAT on that website via my credit card?

It is my understanding that most businesses are required by law to keep a record of their customers electronic payments, probably for at least 10 years. It’s my understanding that this is how it works with Proton.

2) Does Cake Wallet require KYC?

It is my understanding that most crypto wallets do.

9

They will know that you have bought Monero, but they will never know where you spent it because Monero is untracable.

The wallet itself doesn’t, but built-in exchanges do.

10

Isn’t Monero.com a currency exchange? Does that mean it requires KYC? If, yes, what makes it different from other currency exchanges?

11

Monero.com is a wallet, but it has built-in exchanges that are optional.

12

So it’s a wallet by Cake Wallet, which is also a wallet? That’s confusing.
Does the built-in exchanges require KYC?

14

The purpose of the cash is to buy a Tuta gift card. Or are you talking about buying a Google Play gift card?

It’s not clear to me that Tuta allows you to pay for via Google Play. Google doesn’t even allow its own users to pay for Google Drive with a Google Play Gift card.

But even if you are correct, I don’t want to us ea Google account to pay for Tuta. Using a Google account makes me identifiable.