VIRTUAL E-MAIL SHREDDER 2: ZOOMING in to Bigstring.com

Here’s a snippet of Alanis Morissette’s “Ironic”:

“It's a traffic jam when you're already late
It's a no-smoking sign on your cigarette break
It's like ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife
It's meeting the man of my dreams
And then meeting his beautiful wife
And isn't it ironic... don't you think”

Ironic, right? Tragic even.

But here’s an irony which our generation may commonly experience and yet we might not be aware of (alas, another irony) – that e-mails senders (like us) are the ones with the LEAST control over the e-mails WE send. As soon as we click the “send” button, it is the RECIPIENT who can do just about anything with whatever we sent. He may never delete it (which is highly plausible in light of the unlimited storage provided by Google and Yahoo), save it to his personal computer, or worse, forward it to his family, friends, acquintances and (*gasp*) even strangers. He may also do all three. This might not be alarming if you feel that you only send “safe/non-incriminating stuff” via email. But, think. What if you’re wrong? What if that seemingly mundane thing will be used against you in the future? What if you’re really sending something "sensitive"? Think Monica Lewinsky.

Bigstring.com solves this problem. It shifts the control back to YOU. Here, you’re the BOSS over your own email creations. Some of the notable features of this email provider are (1) self-destructing email, (2) recallable or erasable email, (3) non-forwardable email, (4) non-printable or non-savable email, (5) advanced email tracking, and (6) masquerading (ie. using aliases). You can have all these. All you have to do is sign-up for free.

But what do lawmen think about it? Does using the services of Bigstring.com incriminating in itself? Does it imply that the sender is engaged in something suspicious, even illegal?