So Protonmail, are we playing snitch?
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The Protonmail case shows that privacy no longer exists in the West, that the company has lied all the way and that we are definitely being taken for idiots.
Privacy is a big business. Even Facebook cares about your privacy. But when a business has made privacy its core business, users pay for that privacy when free services are 1000 times better, and that business provides user information with the first court request, which contributes to his arrest, then we can say that you have the definition of privacy according to Protonmail.
Protonmail was a completely unknown service until Snowden spoke of it and made it the privacy-conscious mail service, if you are a brave warrior against evil tyrants. For years Protonmail has sold an image of a Swiss-based company with all the marketing packaging that goes with data centers in bunkers in the frozen stealth of the Alps.
But now, a legal request from the French authorities on a climate activist (arguably a dumb vegan) who was using Protonmail and the company tells us that it could do nothing but give the information. That escalated quickly as the other would say. A simple legal request and Protonmail lay like a worm.
I fucking thought Switzerland was a safe haven for privacy? We would have been lied to ??? But the most pathetic and this is where we see Proton’s scam is his press release to discuss the matter. The thing is a mountain of excrement with sticky tongue in every sentence.
The best shit phrase is “we didn’t know he was a climate activist.” So according to Protonmail, privacy should be conditionned to the client’s face? What’s next, requesting proof of vaccination for those who want to sign up for Protonmail?
Any company is subject to its jurisdiction. Switzerland is no longer a haven for privacy, or even banking secrecy, and it has been for 15 years. Americans and Europeans have infiltrated every drop of Lake Geneva. Privacy is not about wanting, it’s about being able to. If Protonmail had designed its service to have “privacy by design,” then it couldn’t have provided the user’s IP address, even with a gun to his head.
Protonmail is marketing blah, because you can build a profitable business with privacy by design. In August 2020, we had proof of this with the OVPN case. OVPN is the VPN used by the administrators of Pirate Bay. And the company suffered a massive legal attack from multiple countries simultaneously. OVPN reacted in mode: Ah, you want the information on one of our users? But make yourself at home, come in and search for yourself ”. They found nothing.
The service was not recording any information or rendering it essentially unusable. It was arguably one of the biggest legal attacks on a business ever, but it resisted with minimal effort, as it designed its service with privacy by design.
Protonmail cannot be trusted like any business that has a presence in the West. Ironically, you’ll find more privacy in Russia or China, as those countries don’t give a damn about Western laws. If you’re at Protonmail, get out of there as fast as you can. Switzerland continues to sell its image as an impregnable fortress, but it has become a sieve like other countries.
