Today we’re opening a technology preview of safedrop Conversations, starting with secure replies. For the first time, the people you send a safedrop to can write back securely, without creating an account.

It’s an early version, and we’re releasing it now on purpose. We think this could change how organisations talk to the public, and we’d rather shape it with the people who will use it than build it in a room on our own. This post explains the problem we’re solving, what the preview does today, and where we think it goes next.

The broken return path

Secure messaging has mostly been a one-way street. An organisation sends something sensitive, securely, and that part works. The trouble starts when the person at the other end needs to reply.

Picture a council officer sending a resident the paperwork for a housing case. The resident has a question and a document to send back. Their options today are usually poor: reply by ordinary email, ring the switchboard, or register for a portal they will use once. Most take the easiest route, and the sensitive reply travels back unprotected.

We’ve long believed that usability is a security property. If the secure route is harder than the insecure one, people will take the insecure one, and nobody can blame them. A secure channel that only works in one direction will be worked around on the way back, and the conversation drops out of the record just when it matters.

How Conversations works today

When you send a safedrop, the recipient opens it exactly as they do now. Alongside your message they’ll see a Reply button. They write their response, attach a file if they need to, and send it straight back to you.

Three things matter here:

• No account. The recipient doesn’t need to sign up, download anything or remember another password. That’s the whole point.
• Still verified. A reply is only possible from someone who has already verified to open your safedrop, and it can only go back to you, within that conversation. safedrop Conversations is not an open inbox anyone can post into.
• Protected on the way back. The reply gets the same protection as the message you sent, [confirm: with zero-knowledge encryption end to end], and  sits alongside the original in your delivery record, so the whole exchange stays on the record.

For the housing officer in our example, that means the resident’s question and document come back securely, without a phone call or a portal registration, and the officer can show what was sent and what came back.

What the preview covers, and what’s coming

This is a technology preview, and we want to be clear about what that means. The preview currently works for safedrops sent by individual users on Teams accounts -It isn’t yet available for shared mailboxes. Some edges are still rough, and that’s exactly why we want people using it.

We’re planning the general release of safedrop Conversations before the end of 2026. Between now and then, what we learn from the preview will decide what we refine, what we add and what we leave out.

Where we think this goes

So let’s scale it up. A local authority is sending a secure message to 5,000 citizens. Most of them don’t need to do anything, but a few hundred will need to respond, confirming details or attaching appropriate documents or raising a problem.

The hard part isn’t letting people reply, it’s getting 400 random replies in an inbox. Somebody would have to read every one and work out what it’s about, and pass it to the right team.

So here’s where we think Conversations goes: sender-controlled replies. The organisation decides who can reply and how. Before a recipient can respond, they might be asked for a case reference, to answer a few short qualifying questions, or to choose what their reply is about. Only then can they reply, and the reply arrives already sorted and ready to act on.

That gives the organisation control over its inbound channel, and it gives residents a clear, simple way to respond without a portal. In effect, it’s a lightweight, secure two-way channel between an organisation and the people it serves, without the cost of building one.

This is direction, not a promise. It’s the part we most want to test with you.

Why this matters

Councils, NHS trusts, law firms and businesses all have the same gap. They can send securely, but they can’t easily receive securely from people who aren’t on their systems. Today that gap is filled by unprotected email, phone calls and portals that most people register for once and never use again.

Portals have their place, but most two-way exchanges don’t justify one. A resident confirming a detail, a patient returning a form or a client sending back a signed document shouldn’t need an account. They should need a secure way to reply, and that’s what we’re building.

Conversations also works alongside the tools you already use. safedrop has never been about replacing Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace. It’s the tool you reach for when something is too sensitive for ordinary email, and now that applies in both directions.

Help us shape it

The whole point of this preview is to hear from you. If you’re on a Teams account, try it out and tell us what works and what doesn’t.

We’d especially like to talk to anyone who sends sensitive communications at scale, to residents, patients, customers or clients. Tell us what your replies look like today and what you would want to control before anyone could reply. Those conversations will shape what sender-controlled replies become.

Get in touch using chat in the bottom corner of the screen.

Angus Bradley

founder,  safedrop