# cock.li review: KYC policy, privacy and safety grades

> cock.li is an email provider operating since 2013. Its terms put it at KYC level 1 of 4: no ID mentioned. NoKYC Score grades it 7.0/10 for privacy (strong) and 4.8/10 for safety (caution). In its favour: no account needed, no email needed and no phone number. To watch: it has no publicly accountable operator. One incident is on record, the latest from 1 Jun 2025.

Source: NoKYC Score, "cock.li review", reviewed 22 Oct 2026, https://nokycscore.com/service/cock-li

## Key facts
- **Category:** Email
- **KYC level:** 1 of 4: No ID mentioned
- **Grades:** Privacy 7.0/10, Safety 4.8/10
- **Sign-up:** No account needed
- **Fees:** Free; donation-funded
- **Onion address:** Yes
- **Incidents on record:** 1
- **Last reviewed:** 22 Oct 2026
- **Official website:** https://cock.li

## What it is
cock.li is a free email and XMPP host run by a small pseudonymous team that says it has been "mostly alive since 2013". The site says the service is free because it has no wish to profit from personal data, and it is funded by donations. It offers a range of deliberately crude domain names, standard IMAP and POP access and hidden-service addresses for the website and for mail protocols. The site provides a form for unblocking outgoing SMTP on new accounts, and some websites reject its domains at registration. It is a conventional mail host and does not advertise end-to-end encryption of stored mail.

## What the terms say about ID
Registration asks for no identity details and the service is reachable over Tor; no terms mention verification.

## Features and warnings
- **Identity:** ID never required: not stated; No account needed: yes; No email needed: yes; No phone number: yes
- **Payment:** Accepts Monero: not stated; Accepts Lightning: not stated; Accepts cash: not stated
- **Access:** Tor onion address: yes; Works without JavaScript: not stated
- **Trust:** Open source: not stated; No-logs policy: not stated; Independent audit: not stated; Company named: no; 5+ years operating: yes
- **Warnings:** May ask for ID: not in terms; Email required: not in terms; Phone number required: not in terms; Closed source: not in terms; Nobody accountable: yes

## Incidents on record
- 1 Jun 2025: Reported theft of about one million user records through retired webmail software (outcome: unknown). Source: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/hacker-steals-1-million-cockli-user-records-in-webmail-data-breach/

## Questions
### Does cock.li require KYC?
cock.li is rated KYC level 1 of 4 on this site: no ID mentioned. Registration asks for no identity details and the service is reachable over Tor; no terms mention verification.

### Is cock.li safe to use?
cock.li has a Safety grade of 4.8 out of 10 and a Privacy grade of 7.0 out of 10. There is 1 incident on record, listed with sources on this page. Evidence level: documentation reviewed.

### Is cock.li legit?
cock.li is a working email provider that has operated since 2013. Its operators do not publish a company or names, so nobody is publicly accountable for it. Being real is not the same as being safe: its Safety grade here is 4.8 out of 10, built from custody, liquidity, track record and incidents.

### Is cock.li a scam?
NoKYC Score does not label services as scams; it records documented incidents with their sources and outcomes. cock.li has 1 incident on record, 1 not resolved, the latest: "Reported theft of about one million user records through retired webmail software". Each is listed on this page with its source.

### Do I need an account or email to use cock.li?
No account needed.

### What fees does cock.li charge?
Free; donation-funded. Fees were recorded from cock.li's own pages and can change; check before you send.

### Does cock.li have a Tor onion address?
Yes. cock.li publishes an official onion address, shown on this page. Open it in Tor Browser.

### Can I use cock.li over Tor?
Yes. cock.li publishes an official onion address, shown on this page.

## Sources
- https://cock.li

How grades are calculated: https://nokycscore.com/methodology