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Proton Mail Helped FBI Unmask Anonymous 'Stop Cop City' Protester
- sam0x17 7mo agoWell I guess Proton cannot be trusted. You know what they say, centralization corrupts absolutely
- mystraline 7mo agoGiven they were praising Trump, Vance, and gang - I called it then. I cancelled my Proton account when all of that hit Mastodon. Their VPN was good, but I dont support nazies and their toadies.
- Vaslo 7mo ago[flagged]
- Computer0 7mo agoWell I care. I am more informed because of their comment. I now know that I must avoid Proton.
- worksonmine 7mo agoI don't know what Proton did regarding Trump, but if you follow this principle to the end you might as well ditch technology and live in the forest. I'm not being hyperbole, everyone does business with or endorses someone on either side who does stupid shit.
- albumen 7mo agoMore informed by that comment, really? Did you read this[0]? As someone disinterested in the topic, the controversy seems very overblown and a knee jerk response. His position seems to have been pretty consistent over time. [0]: https://medium.com/@ovenplayer/does-proton-really-support-trump-a-deeper-analysis-and-surprising-findings-aed4fee4305e https://medium.com/@ovenplayer/does-proton-really-support-tr...
- deleted 7mo ago[deleted]
- dgxyz 7mo agoWe do care. Someone's gotta stand up to it.
- Vaslo 7mo agoThey’ll still be in business in 20 years. So much for all that standing up.
- idiotsecant 7mo ago[flagged]
- Vaslo 7mo ago[flagged]
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- GuinansEyebrows 7mo ago> The only whinging I see is people using terms like Nazi for everyone they disagree with what an oddly specific example
- Vaslo 7mo agoWhat’s oddly specific about it?
- GolfPopper 7mo agoI wasn't even aware of anything around Proton and specific US political parties. Thank you for your post, as it led me to some searching. The single most useful link I found was this Reddit thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/ProtonMail/comments/1i2nz9v/on_politics_and_proton_a_message_from_andy/ https://www.reddit.com/r/ProtonMail/comments/1i2nz9v/on_poli...
- platevoltage 7mo agoGood enough reason to never trust them.
- lucb1e 7mo agoIn trying to check this claim (I thought Proton did sensible things), I found that the submitted news article is not new at all: > [Proton's] homepage touts that “With Proton, your data belongs to you, not tech companies, governments, or hackers.” However, [...] Proton previously handed over an IP address at the request of French authorities made via Europol to Swiss police. Yen wrote a Twitter post at the time, stating, “Proton must comply with Swiss law. As soon as a crime is committed, privacy protections can be suspended and we’re required by Swiss law to answer requests from Swiss authorities.” ---https://theintercept.com/2025/01/28/proton-mail-andy-yen-trump-republicans/ https://theintercept.com/2025/01/28/proton-mail-andy-yen-tru... Big surprise: swiss company complies with swiss law! And the same happened now, quoting the part of the submission that you can read without signing up: > privacy-focused email provider Proton Mail handed over payment data related to a Stop Cop City email account to the Swiss government, which handed it to the FBI. Anyway, regarding your claim, it's a whole rabbit hole of statements they made but broadly speaking it sounds like you're right: Vance supported legislation which Proton campaigned for and, subsequently (as of 2025-01), Proton loves the US Republican Party, believing they would stand up for 'the little guy'. To be fair, they bring some evidence that sound like it can be verified and back this opinion up somewhat, but even if it's a correct opinion on this sub-topic, it's still supporting authoritarianism. Anyway, this is where I'm going to stop trying to politically analyze their situation and just not recommend Proton anymore...
- bdcravens 7mo agoIt seems they aren't violating the promise about "your data", and are handing over "their data" (IP addresses, payment data)
- lucb1e 7mo agoThat seems quite irrelevant in the bigger picture. I'm not recommending a company that campaigns for an authoritarian party, not even to other people in that camp. It's just immoral
- Anonbrit 7mo agoI don't think any commercial entity can be trusted to break the law on behalf of customers who only pay a small fee each
- sithadmin 7mo agoAs a long time Proton customer...I am fairly certain Proton has always been completely upfront that they will comply with lawful requests for information from the Swiss authorities, if response is obligated by Swiss law. Therefore this isn't especially surprising.
- bombcar 7mo agoThe key is and always has been to make sure that someone like Proton simply doesn't have the information so they can't give it away.
- WithinReason 7mo agoExactly, you can use bitcoin, even cash. You can even add credits with PayPal or a credit card, in which case Proton (I assume) won't remember your payment data. But if you attach credit card info permanently to your account then it can be retrieved.
- wolvoleo 7mo agoThis is just impossible. If they're going to be sending your email to gmail then they need to see what's in it. So they will have the data at some point. You have to trust their brown eyes that they don't look at it while it's going through their inbound and outbound servers. But they're selling it as a technical protection, not a trust-based one. Personally, if you want private Comms, just don't use email. The protocol is just not suitable.
- ranger_danger 7mo agoIt's wild to me that people are downvoting this. Nobody is going to jail for you...
- thephyber 7mo agoIn this case, it was Swiss courts who forced them to comply, not foreign courts. And from what little I can tell from the article, it was account payment data, not content from the account. Proton was never designed or advertised to resist this kind of threat.
- dgxyz 7mo agoWhat Proton sell you is reduction of anxiety. But that's a lie. The whole idea of encrypted email is pointless. There's absolutely no guarantee it's encrypted in transit or encrypted at rest on any machines it transits through unless you encapsulate the messages with PGP and then you still leave a trail of envelopes everywhere. Any government who wants your data will come round and beat it out of you or the provider as best as they can. And if you have the pay the provider, as evidenced here, they can point to you and then beat you for it. Beating being metaphorical or otherwise. Use any old shitty email provider and make sure you can move off it quickly if you need to. Standard IMAP, not weird ass proprietary stuff like proton. Think carefully what you do and say. Use a side channel for anything that actually requires security.
- SunshineTheCat 7mo agoWild that it says this on their site: >Sign up with no phone number: Get a private email account without handing over more personal data than necessary, making it harder for advertisers, data brokers, and other services to track you online. I guess it doesn't mention law enforcement so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- ranger_danger 7mo agoThe article explains that the account was identified based on a credit card payment for a paid account, which does not invalidate the statement in question IMO. Perhaps we differ on the definition of "private" or something else, but unless all parties are using proton, email is inherently insecure and somebody can/will have a record of your communication regardless.
- lucb1e 7mo ago> unless all parties are using proton, email is inherently insecure and somebody can/will have a record of your communication regardless. That the person you're exchanging messages with, has your messages, is hardly a surprise. Not everyone-but-Proton sells your data though so it's not quite that black-and-white
- ranger_danger 7mo agoYou're not wrong, but I think it just means you can never be 100% safe, as even the recipient of your message may be secretly working against you.
- gruez 7mo agoI'm not sure what you were expecting here. If you have data and the police shows up with a warrant, you can't just tell them "nah we don't feel like it".
- drnick1 7mo agoYou can do what Signal does: store basically no data, so that you don't have any data to hand over.
- petcat 7mo ago> The records provide insight into the sort of data that Proton Mail, which prides itself both on its end-to-end encryption and that it is only governed by Swiss privacy law, can and does provide to third parties. Didn't Proton already say that they were physically relocating their servers outside of Switzerland because the Swiss government couldn't be trusted? Although I guess the server location didn't matter in this case since all they wanted was the billing information and the credit card info to identify the person.
- VWWHFSfQ 7mo ago> prides itself both on its end-to-end encryption Their end-to-end encryption is pointless because the vast majority of any recipients will just leak the plaintext emails via their own account providers anyway. It only works under very specific circumstances (all parties are using it). I think their marketing overstates what their secure private email actually means.
- njarboe 7mo agoYes. If you send an email from a protonmail account to a gmail account that email is in google's system. Same if in the other direction. Would anyone using protonmail not know this. I would guess at least 99.9% of proton users understand this.
- elashri 7mo ago> Didn't Proton already say that they were physically relocating their servers outside of Switzerland because the Swiss government couldn't be trusted? They said they want to relocate to Germany which I would say in a polite way, is much worse in this regard.
- spelk 7mo agoIn what sense? Germany has among the strongest judicial oversight for invasion of privacy in Europe. Due process is followed when securing search warrants that provide access to subscriber data (Germany does not have administrative subpoenas like in the US and other countries). Former attempts at surveillance have been struck down in the Bundesverfassungsgericht, and the right to privacy has even been affirmed for foreigners (as opposed to other countries like the US that reserve that foreign nationals have zero due process rights for invasion of privacy).
- h4kunamata 7mo agoPeople will never understand, Proton is a privacy based email server, it is not the dark web where you can do as you please without consequences. Proton only has access to your IP and device ID, not your data. With IP and device ID, you can easily track an user like finding the ISP, etc. Do you wanna do naughty things?? Don't use such services do to so. And ironically,this 404 Media is the only place I found covering this information and they require you to login to read the whole thing. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm red flag big time!!!!
- observationist 7mo agoProton isn't opsec, it's just the best available commercial clearweb host that still has to follow all the laws and comply with warrants, but won't be arbitrarily selling your metadata or engaging in the adtech garbage. Kagi is to google as proton is to gmail. You get web mail, custom domains, decent security, decent spam detection, solid features, and no PII being sold. Nice, clean, simple - I like paying them money. I feel good about doing business with them, and I don't run into that often these days.
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- rationalist 7mo agoSounds like Fastmail, except Fastmail is less sketchy and has better deliverability.
- wswin 7mo agoWhat's sketchy about proton?
- SoftTalker 7mo agoI don't know if sketchy is the right word but every* time I encounter a proton mail user on a mailing list, they are tinfoil-hat paranoid. Like they are a random nobody, but they are convinced that "the Russians" or "the Chinese" are constantly hacking at their laptop and they are constantly trying to harden everything so much one wonders why they even bother using computers at all. * OK "every" is an exaggeration but enough that the impression has been formed.
- _alternator_ 7mo agoMan 404 Media is really crushing it lately. Thanks to the team!
- CodeWriter23 7mo agoThis should surprise exactly nobody after it was disclosed back in [checks notes] 2021 that ProtonMail gave up user data to law enforcement and also changed their TOS.
- gruez 7mo ago>after it was disclosed back in [checks notes] 2021 that ProtonMail gave up user data to law enforcement and also changed their TOS. You shouldn't even need that. A warrant isn't a strongly worded letter that they can just turn down. It's the law. Therefore you should assume that if the police can get a warrant, they can get your data. Even for people who don't follow the law (criminals), there's no guarantee they won't snitch on you.
- brokensegue 7mo agothey used to claim that being Swiss based protected them from warrants like this
- gruez 7mo agoSource? We need the exact claim here, because there's a fine line between "we're in switzerland, so warrants aren't a thing!" (outright false) and "we're in switzerland, which have better privacy laws than other countries!" (debatable).
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- latexr 7mo agoI’m not the person who made the claim, but a basic web search led me to this page on their blog: https://proton.me/blog/data-privacy-abortion https://proton.me/blog/data-privacy-abortion Quote (emphasis theirs, in bold): > Switzerland is a fundamentally different environment. Two of the things Switzerland is most famous for are also highly conducive to data protection: privacy and neutrality. > When a law enforcement agency in the US requests user data from a Swiss company, it is illegal for that company to provide the data. At Proton, we reject all data requests from foreign agencies. > Proton and other Swiss companies will only hand over user data when ordered to do so by a Swiss authority. And even then, Proton’s general policy is to challenge data requests whenever possible and only comply after all legal remedies have been exhausted. So maybe your parent poster is confused? They do claim that being Swiss protects them from requests from foreign entities, but not Swiss entities. Which is what happened here, the Swiss authorities asked Proton for the data, then they handed it to the FBI. Has Proton challenged the data and “only complied after all legal remedies have been exhausted”, though? That’s another question.
- loteck 7mo agoWhere are the stories about all the other mail providers who routinely cough up everything about your email account, including full content, metadata, and full payment details, on a daily basis? Proton is one of the few services who accepts anonymous payment, and cannot themselves provide encrypted content in cleartext. They cannot save you from yourself, though.
- encrypted_bird 7mo agoThey accept anonymous payment? I could've sworn they require an account...
- wildzzz 7mo agoYou can literally mail an envelope of cash to them and they'll credit your account. Probably the best way to remain anonymous. At worst, they'll have the zip code from where it was mailed from and potential fingerprints. But since an envelope isn't really a financial record, I doubt they would hold onto it.
- encrypted_bird 7mo agoOkay I think I just misunderstood. I guess I was assuming "paying for the service anonymously" meant "paying such that the person using the service is anonymous", not "anonymously paying for the service". Haha. Syntax is fun!
- toofy 7mo agoi can’t speak for the journalists who wrote the story, but i assume it’s due to how prominently proton markets their email as safe/private/encrypted and then it turns out they may be sharing data with the swiss government who then gives it to the us government. it absolutely should be news when the company who heavily promoted themselves to normies as safe, encrypted, and private is sharing customers data which is ending up in the hands of authoritarian foreign governments who are hunting for protesters.
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- kittikitti 7mo agoThank you for sharing. I was trialing Proton Mail but I will move away from it because of this. This is some teenage level crime and legitimate protesting that it threw away its reputation for.
- coppsilgold 7mo agoDoes Proton store the payment information tied to an account for the duration of a potential chargeback period or indefinitely? Whether they store such info for cryptocurrency payments as well (no chargeback risk) would be telling.
- laweijfmvo 7mo agoProton won’t lock me out of my email because I accidentally sang a copyrighted song in a Youtube video. That’s why I use it, not because it’s the pirate bay for email.
- latexr 7mo ago> Proton won’t lock me out of my email because I accidentally sang a copyrighted song in a Youtube video. Is there a specific story you’re referring to? Mind sharing a link? I have no intention of disputing it, I just haven’t heard of that particular case.
- laweijfmvo 7mo agothere are plenty of examples throughout history, although i haven’t heard much about it recently. tl;dr you don’t have a gmail account, you have a google account. if that account gets banned on one service, you may lose everything.
- latexr 7mo ago> tl;dr you don’t have a gmail account, you have a google account. if that account gets banned on one service, you may lose everything. I’m perfectly aware. > there are plenty of examples throughout history I’m not asking about plenty of them, I’m asking about one. Has there been a case where, as you said, Google has banned an account because someone sang a copyrighted song in a video? That’s the one I want to read about. I don’t have any sympathy for large corporations and I don’t use Google services, I just want to be informed about draconian tech decisions. Did you make up that story? It’s OK if you did as a hyperbole, I just want to know.
- laweijfmvo 7mo agoit’s hyperbole as far as i know
- kube-system 7mo agoThey updated YouTube rules so it no longer is the case. But just the other week there were stories all over HN about Google banning accounts for accidental Gemini ToS violations
- thegrim33 7mo agoLet me guess .. they weren't going after a "protestor" like the headline would try to lead you to believe. "Authorities were investigating [them] for their connection to arson, vandalism and doxing" And there it is.
- scoofy 7mo agoI don't know what is in the water, but "I can do crimes, as long as it's part of a protest" seems to be what people actually think these days. Civil disobedience means accepting punishment. Literally "letter from Birmingham jail" was sent from a jail in Birmingham for a reason.
- BoredPositron 7mo agoProton = Privacy Theater. Always has been.
- jesse_dot_id 7mo agoUnsurprising. If you don't want to receive the punishment for thought crimes, which is being threatened outright more loudly every day, it's increasingly difficult to actually have a dissenting voice online. Don't believe me? Set up a linux VM, Mullvad VPN with a killswitch, then run Tor browser. You MAY be able to get a TutaMail account, which requires a backup e-mail that disappears after a short period of time (allegedly), and then a Proton account with the TutaMail account as your required backup there, but all of the privacy-first "anonymous" services require some form of verification. Then, if the social media network isn't blocking you from signing up via a Tor exit nodes outright, you are immediately shadow banned. I remain very annoyed with the massive number of engineers that are making it possible for people who can't figure out how to check their e-mail to utilize advanced technology to spy on us, steal our tax money, pervert the technologies we build, and indiscriminately murder innocent people. We are a community of greedy ladder pullers and that's so disappointing.
- emeril 7mo agoI generally just use tor browser and proton (verified through a disposable email address only accessed via the tor browser) - seems secure enough for me? I use it often...
- jesse_dot_id 7mo agoHow old are the accounts?
- fc417fc802 7mo ago> verified through a disposable email address To the extent it works that's a loophole. I can't speak to proton specifically but the majority of services don't want to permit disposable email because the entire point is to cut down on spam and abuse. I can appreciate having the option of providing a phone number or email or whatever but I think the state of the ecosystem is telling. The option for anonymous email with PoW per outgoing email isn't provided despite largely addressing the commonly cited rationale for requiring some sort of verification. And we're still stuck bashing PGP, shilling for competing E2E message solutions while it's plain as day that the vast majority of commerce isn't going to move off of email any time soon. Meanwhile TLS can figure out how to distribute public keys via DNS as part of implementing ECH in all major browsers over a period of less than a decade.
- burnt-resistor 7mo agoDumb Lavabit with extra privacy-washed marketing.
- unethical_ban 7mo agoAs a proton user I know I am not completely anonymous. I pay them for their bundle of services because I get VPN, encrypted password storage and email that isn't scanned for ads and other purposes. Privacy and anonymity are a gradient. If I needed real opsec from government threats I wouldn't tie a credit card to a service.
- bronco21016 7mo agoWhy is there a paywall AND anti-aging snake oil ads? Pick one. If that's the type of ad you sell it signals to me the site is absolutely not worth the subscription.
- amatecha 7mo agoProton Mail complied with a legal demand they had no choice but to comply with, providing the basic shred of information the user willingly and knowingly provided. You want to be anonymous? Don't use your credit card! Don't connect from your home internet connection. (I don't know whether this person did because I can't read the story due to login-requirement). Either way, total non-story. Anyone whose potential adversary is a powerful government should already know this stuff. Either way, Proton didn't help the FBI. The article title is deceptive and implies a degree of insidiousness or dishonesty that has not been demonstrated by Proton in this case.
- GS523523 7mo ago> Either way, Proton didn't help the FBI. > Proton Mail complied with a legal demand they had no choice but to comply with
- brookst 7mo agoYou seem to think those two quotes make a point, but for the life of me I’m not seeing it? Are you trying to say that any compliance is by definition help? Like if the FBI subpoenas my public key and I comply, that’s helping them?
- Joker_vD 7mo ago> Like if the FBI subpoenas my public key and I comply, that’s helping them? If you're helping the FBI to do their job (conducting federal investigations), then yes, you are helping the FBI. Unless your definition of "to help" includes the absence of any possibly coercive circumstance.
- brookst 7mo agoAn, so just semantics about “to help” and whether it involves volition.
- panja 7mo agoIf I'm not mistaken, proton didn't give anything to the FBI, they provided what was required by law to the Swiss government who then gave it to the FBI. It's a small distinction but it matters.
- eviks 7mo ago> Proton did not provide any information to the FBI ... Swiss justice department > This is an important distinction Not really, that's a minute procedural distinction without a difference. > can only happen after all Swiss legal checks are passed. Oh, don't worry, US also has some "checks", just as useful! > we understood that a law enforcement officer was shot and explosive devices were involved And now you're just compounding your fail by siding with the notorious liars against your own customers.
- realityking 7mo agoWhat do you think they should’ve done when faced with a legal warrant from the jurisdiction they operate in?
- eviks 7mo agoThey should've prepared themselves and their customers better before that happens - one tiny example: there is no anon payment option listed at the main payment flow and no warning that credit card. Or maybe there is some smart way of not having permanent access to the payment identifier, only during the time of payment? Re. at the moment not sure, that depends on their jurisdiction, but that's another thing - why don't they explain what's possible and what and why they did/didn't do?
- akimbostrawman 7mo agoI agree that they should offer private and anonymous payment like monero and cash. They do talk about using a VPN and Tor to hide your IP but its kind of hidden in the footer. https://proton.me/tor https://proton.me/tor
- danlivingston 7mo agohttps://proton.me/support/payment-options https://proton.me/support/payment-options Quote: You can pay for any Proton subscription with Bitcoin — but it won’t appear as a payment option when you first create your account. To use Bitcoin, create a free Proton Account, then upgrade to a paid subscription in your account settings. Quote: We accept cash payments in US dollars (USD), euros (EUR), or Swiss francs (CHF).
- foundart 7mo ago> A court record reviewed by 404 Media shows privacy-focused email provider Proton Mail handed over payment data related to a Stop Cop City email account to the Swiss government, which handed it to the FBI.
- KerrickStaley 7mo agohttps://archive.is/cGvKG https://archive.is/cGvKG
- jacyro 7mo agoNot exactly the best article. Proton complied with a lawful Swiss request. Their ToS clearly state what they can provide if requests are lawful. The Proton user had bad opsec by using a credit card to pay for the account. Had Proton just turned data over to an out of jurisdiction LEA, then it's more of a complaint. But they followed their policy and law here. Proton offers a Tor address for accounts requiring anonymity rather than just privacy. The crux of this is on the account user
- Markoff 7mo agoWouldn't make more sense to not store information (or have it encrypted without proton having access to it), so they would have nothing to share even if they were forced to comply?
- tpoacher 7mo agoAs memers say, of all things that didn't happen, this one didn't happen the most.
- Frieren 7mo agoAs it should be. All corporations must follow the law. If the police has an order signed by a judge then it is lawful and a necessity for society to work to follow the law. What is horrifying are big corporations giving access to all user data without recourse. That my data in Europe is send to the USA and accessed without limits by their goverment is a crime and a very dangerous situation. - Fighting crime in an open criminal case with judge oversight is a very good thing and part of keeping the rule of law. - Collecting data from all users without probable cause is a crime and will have nefarious consequences for all of us. Know the difference.
- Jolliness7501 7mo agoThis is feedback from Proton Mail Team I got about this matter: "Thank you for reaching out and sharing your concern. We understand why this story is alarming, and we want to give you a clear picture of what actually happened. First, Proton did not provide any information to the FBI. The data was obtained by the Swiss Federal Department of Justice through a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) process. Proton operates exclusively under Swiss law and only responds to legally binding orders from Swiss authorities, after all Swiss legal checks have been passed. This is clearly stated in our TOS and Privacy Policy. In this specific case, Swiss authorities determined that the legal bar was met because a law enforcement officer had been shot, and explosive devices were involved during an incident in 2024. Switzerland has one of the strictest privacy frameworks in the world, and legal assistance is only granted in cases involving serious criminal matters. Importantly, the only information that could be disclosed was a payment identifier because the user chose to pay by credit card although Proton accepts gift cards, cryptocurrency and cash. No emails, no message content, and no communications metadata were handed over. This actually demonstrates how little data Proton holds by design, our end-to-end encryption means we cannot access email content even if ordered to. We hope this provides some reassurance. Please don't hesitate to reach out if you have any further questions. Best Regards, The Proton Mail Team"
- Digit-Al 7mo agoIt says all that in the article.
- psteinweber 7mo agoWhich is paywalled, so thanks for posting it here.
- lucb1e 7mo agoNothing of that email is new to me, and I didn't read the login-walled part which was like the third paragraph onward or something (I think it said it's free to read once you sign up, so not a paywall, but yeah either way)
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- Haven880 7mo agoUsing Proton for privacy and security is quite ignorant. They are known to support legal requests without ever challenge that request. At least Yahoo has way better record than Proton. I use Proton, but never for privacy reason. It is as good as hotmail and yahoo mail. If you truly care privacy do it in another country. So qq mail and yandex mail have zero chance being look at by any western authorities. And the same with if you distrustful of China and Russia which cant look into Google mail.