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Protonmail should be pushing more of this messaging in their branding. "Don't trust us further than you can throw us. We're doing our best, and here's what we

Protonmail should be pushing more of this messaging in their branding. "Don't trust us further than you can throw us. We're doing our best, and here's what we recommend, use Tor, etc."

winrid 5y ago
This is just not realistic, though.
- pseudalopex 5y ago
  Why not?
  - umvi 5y ago
    "we aren't much better than Gmail from a privacy standpoint, but please still give us money"
    - pseudalopex 5y ago
      Does every email provider but Gmail make the same misleading claim as ProtonMail? Fastmail for example?
      - bigiain 5y ago
        I like and respect Fastmail. but... I live in Australia - and they're totally fucked by our laws and government policy. "The Australian Federal Police (AFP) and Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC) will now be able to access the computers and networks of those suspected of conducting criminal activity online, and even take over their online accounts covertly, under the Identify and Disrupt bill, which was passed by the Senate on Wednesday." -- https://www.innovationaus.com/extraordinary-new-hacking-powers-pass-parliament/ https://www.innovationaus.com/extraordinary-new-hacking-powe... and: "Amends: the Surveillance Devices Act 2004 and Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act 1979 to: introduce data disruption warrants to enable the Australian Federal Police (AFP) and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC) to disrupt data by modifying, adding, copying or deleting data in order to frustrate the commission of serious offences online; and make minor technical corrections; " -- https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislation/Bills_Search_Results/Result?bId=r6623 https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislat...
        pseudalopex 5y ago
        The question was if email providers have to choose misleading people about privacy or going out of business. Specifically about IP logs. Fastmail's privacy page says "Your data is for you and no one else".[1] So they do mislead about that. I didn't see anything about IP logs though. And Fastmail was just an example. [1] https://www.fastmail.com/privacy-and-security/ https://www.fastmail.com/privacy-and-security/
    - mikeyjk 5y ago
      I thought Gmail was much worse, scanning email contents etc.
      - sellyme 5y ago
        The scanning of email contents that Gmail does is, from a privacy standpoint, indistinguishable from them simply sending you the email. Their server has to know the contents of that email either way.
        sodality2 5y ago
        >The scanning of email contents that Gmail does is, from a privacy standpoint, indistinguishable from them simply sending you the email The privacy violation of creating a profile on me based on my mail to tailor ads is not the same thing as simply delivering mail.
        kevin_thibedeau 5y ago
        That's the price of a free service. It's always been the gmail MO. Do you want to get something for nothing at all?
        sodality2 5y ago
        Yet protonmail doesn't do that at zero cost. I also gladly do pay for email providers.
        kevin_thibedeau 5y ago
        So one business offers a loss leader and every competitor has to be rebuked for not matching them?
        sellyme 5y ago
        In both cases exactly the same entities read your email: you, the sender, and Gmail. I don't see how you could go "yeah, this is a privacy improvement" if your information is still visible to exactly the same entities, but one of them isn't really mentioning it.
    - barbacoa 5y ago
      Most people accept search warrants signed by a judge for a crime. Proton mail was even nice enough to notify the user what they were the subject of a search. With Gmail/Hotmail/etc your communication are at the finger tips of governments for non-criminal domestic surveillance. For example it has been alleged that the NSA leaked private emails of a journalist in order to score political damage. https://nypost.com/2021/08/11/tucker-carlson-unmasking-claims-to-be-examined-by-nsa-watchdog/ https://nypost.com/2021/08/11/tucker-carlson-unmasking-claim...
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - Godel_unicode 5y ago
    Because of the dirty little secret of protonmail; it's actually just privacy cosplay. If they told people what's actually involved in having a truly private email account, most of their customers would say screw it and go back to Gmail.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- istingray 5y ago
  I gave an example in another post. Basically "Hey, we respect your needs. However, we have to tell you that you should treat us as a bit of an adversary. We will do what we can as a private company, but ultimately we can be compelled by the government, rogue employee, or if somehow we get hacked. This is the case for any company, they just don't tell you it. We do. As our customer, here's what we recommend you do: Use Tor, fund open source, vote, etc."
- taneq 5y ago
  Of course not, because a company that strikes the perfect balance of being sorta-in-the-right-direction but then also using deliberately deceptive language to pretend they're all-the-way-in-the-right-direction is going to outcompete companies that genuinely go all the way.
truthwhisperer 5y ago
they should destroy the email box due to a technical error so the user knows something is wrong

Protonmail should be pushing more of this messaging in their branding. "Don't trust us further than you can throw us. We're doing our best, and here's what we recommend, use Tor, etc."

winrid 5y ago

This is just not realistic, though.

pseudalopex 5y ago
Why not?
- umvi 5y ago
  "we aren't much better than Gmail from a privacy standpoint, but please still give us money"
  - pseudalopex 5y ago
    Does every email provider but Gmail make the same misleading claim as ProtonMail? Fastmail for example?
    - bigiain 5y ago
      I like and respect Fastmail. but... I live in Australia - and they're totally fucked by our laws and government policy. "The Australian Federal Police (AFP) and Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC) will now be able to access the computers and networks of those suspected of conducting criminal activity online, and even take over their online accounts covertly, under the Identify and Disrupt bill, which was passed by the Senate on Wednesday." -- https://www.innovationaus.com/extraordinary-new-hacking-powers-pass-parliament/ https://www.innovationaus.com/extraordinary-new-hacking-powe... and: "Amends: the Surveillance Devices Act 2004 and Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act 1979 to: introduce data disruption warrants to enable the Australian Federal Police (AFP) and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC) to disrupt data by modifying, adding, copying or deleting data in order to frustrate the commission of serious offences online; and make minor technical corrections; " -- https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislation/Bills_Search_Results/Result?bId=r6623 https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislat...
      - pseudalopex 5y ago
        The question was if email providers have to choose misleading people about privacy or going out of business. Specifically about IP logs. Fastmail's privacy page says "Your data is for you and no one else".[1] So they do mislead about that. I didn't see anything about IP logs though. And Fastmail was just an example. [1] https://www.fastmail.com/privacy-and-security/ https://www.fastmail.com/privacy-and-security/
  - mikeyjk 5y ago
    I thought Gmail was much worse, scanning email contents etc.
    - sellyme 5y ago
      The scanning of email contents that Gmail does is, from a privacy standpoint, indistinguishable from them simply sending you the email. Their server has to know the contents of that email either way.
      - sodality2 5y ago
        >The scanning of email contents that Gmail does is, from a privacy standpoint, indistinguishable from them simply sending you the email The privacy violation of creating a profile on me based on my mail to tailor ads is not the same thing as simply delivering mail.
        kevin_thibedeau 5y ago
        That's the price of a free service. It's always been the gmail MO. Do you want to get something for nothing at all?
        sodality2 5y ago
        Yet protonmail doesn't do that at zero cost. I also gladly do pay for email providers.
        kevin_thibedeau 5y ago
        So one business offers a loss leader and every competitor has to be rebuked for not matching them?
        sellyme 5y ago
        In both cases exactly the same entities read your email: you, the sender, and Gmail. I don't see how you could go "yeah, this is a privacy improvement" if your information is still visible to exactly the same entities, but one of them isn't really mentioning it.
  - barbacoa 5y ago
    Most people accept search warrants signed by a judge for a crime. Proton mail was even nice enough to notify the user what they were the subject of a search. With Gmail/Hotmail/etc your communication are at the finger tips of governments for non-criminal domestic surveillance. For example it has been alleged that the NSA leaked private emails of a journalist in order to score political damage. https://nypost.com/2021/08/11/tucker-carlson-unmasking-claims-to-be-examined-by-nsa-watchdog/ https://nypost.com/2021/08/11/tucker-carlson-unmasking-claim...
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- Godel_unicode 5y ago
  Because of the dirty little secret of protonmail; it's actually just privacy cosplay. If they told people what's actually involved in having a truly private email account, most of their customers would say screw it and go back to Gmail.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
istingray 5y ago
I gave an example in another post. Basically "Hey, we respect your needs. However, we have to tell you that you should treat us as a bit of an adversary. We will do what we can as a private company, but ultimately we can be compelled by the government, rogue employee, or if somehow we get hacked. This is the case for any company, they just don't tell you it. We do. As our customer, here's what we recommend you do: Use Tor, fund open source, vote, etc."
taneq 5y ago
Of course not, because a company that strikes the perfect balance of being sorta-in-the-right-direction but then also using deliberately deceptive language to pretend they're all-the-way-in-the-right-direction is going to outcompete companies that genuinely go all the way.

truthwhisperer 5y ago

they should destroy the email box due to a technical error so the user knows something is wrong