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submitted 4 months ago by jrcruciani@lemmy.wtf to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

Awesome...

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[-] Charger8232@lemmy.ml 211 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Proton was legally ordered by the Swiss justice department to hand over the (severely limited) information about a law breaking organization's account. They had paid for Proton using a credit card instead of the anonymous payment methods Proton offers, and that is what Proton was forced to hand over. It was the organization's bad OpSec, not Proton willingly deanonymizing users.

[-] LytiaNP@lemmy.today 62 points 4 months ago

Hopefully people like you will be able to nip this in the bud before yet another joke of a controversy starts...

[-] NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip 57 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

You must be new here...

On the one hand, I really like how often Proton's shortcomings are highlighted. This SHOULD be a wake up call that you should never rely on a company to protect you and should instead focus on what you can do to ptorect yourself. And Proton... actually are pretty good in that regard. Connect from a burner/live image computer over public wifi using tor (or something similar) and their free accounts are STILL the gold standard for journalism and whistleblowers.

But the problem is that people are stupid and lazy (and many outlets actively benefit from "Eww, proton is bad. If only they had paid for NordVPN to really protect them from the FBI! ~Note, NordVPN provides no guarantees of protection~ ". So we just get stupidity.

[-] Charger8232@lemmy.ml 28 points 4 months ago

OP's title certainly doesn't help.

[-] cypherpunks@lemmy.ml 6 points 4 months ago

Why do you think Proton stores the association between accounts and payment identity?

Many privacy-oriented companies actually accept credit card payments and simply don't store that information.

answer:proton is snake oil

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[-] GreenShimada@lemmy.world 23 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Really, this headline should be "Organization so poorly organized that they messed up having relatively secure email."

[-] halcyoncmdr@piefed.social 18 points 4 months ago

Not at all. Proton doesn't require any personal info at all. But if you pay with a credit card... That has your personal info tied to it. It's their fuck up paying with a credit card. Proton accepts other payment methods that aren't tied to your identity.

Proton is required by law to provide information they have when the courts say so.

[-] toynbee@piefed.social 8 points 4 months ago

So I'm not a criminal organization as far as I know, but if I did pay with a credit card originally can that be rectified without deleting and starting over?

[-] AmbitiousProcess@piefed.social 6 points 4 months ago

Proton uses Chargebee for payments, which has its own data retention policy of essentially "as long as we want to", but Proton does themselves keep limited data like the billing name, and last 4 digits.

Proton's privacy policy says nothing about a pre-set time delay after which they'd delete that data. They only claim that they "reserve our right" to remove your payment information if they think it's no longer valid. So theoretically, that might mean if your card's expiry date has passed, but that's not a confirmation.

The best way to reliably make sure Proton wouldn't have any info on you is to not have ever tied any real information about yourself or your payment info to that account.

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[-] JustEnoughDucks@feddit.nl 7 points 4 months ago

Yeah, I am no fan of proton and they have lied before (no log VPN logs magically finding logs for authorities and then later removing the no-log claim).

But this is literally just proton being legally compelled to hand over data the user willingly gave (not being harvested or de-encrypted). A nothing story.

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[-] North@lemmy.org 30 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Some people in the comment section are really dumb switching to other alternatives thinking that Proton isn't trustworthy because they gave the information despite the organisation not using anonymous currency. What's ironic is that some of these people are switching to those alternatives where you can't even use anonymous currency.

Also, kind of a clickbait title.

[-] jjlinux@lemmy.zip 19 points 4 months ago

They gave payment data to the authorities, because, guess what, they HAVE to provide whatever is subpoenaed. Did they provide emails, IP addresses? Doesn't say any of that. There's the option of paying with crypto, but the imbeciles that know they are going to be at risk of being found, paid with a credit or debit card.

404 media is more of the same sensationalism laden bullshit out there. Make a fucking Strom out of a drop of water.

[-] BigTuffAl@lemmy.zip 15 points 4 months ago

just really sad to call yourself a privacy company and then feed your customer to the gestapo

people can end up as embarrassing footnotes in history a number of different ways, but being a dishonest coward company in the privacy sphere is basically speedrunning it

[-] hackitfast@lemmy.world 10 points 4 months ago

I never trusted ProtonMail. Right when you sign up, you're constantly bombarded with advertisements to upgrade to pro. They're plastered everywhere with obnoxious banners.

I get that they're a business and they need money to operate, but the ads are so obnoxiously "in your face" that in my mind their priority isn't your privacy, it's your money.

Tutamail is the better service.

[-] Scrollone@feddit.it 6 points 4 months ago

Plus, the owner of Proton said that Trump also did good things.

That was the straw that broke the camel's back.

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[-] glitching@lemmy.ml 11 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

article in case you can't read it: ~~lemmy.ml/post/44086795~~ edit: better link in a reply.

proton coulda put up a fight, a loud one, for optics sake if nothing else. rolling over on any (and by implication, all) request should be the last straw in their long line of snafus; by way of "death by a thousand cuts", I would never entrust them with anything of importance.

signal demonstrated that you could decouple payment info from user data and a shop that touts the privacy part of their offerings coulda at least mimic such a thing.

edit 2: fuck any and all pay-with-crypto shills and the horse they rode in on.

[-] cypherpunks@lemmy.ml 5 points 4 months ago

article in case you can’t read it: https://lemmy.ml/post/44086795

that link only has two paragraphs of the article; there are 8 more in the full article here on archive.org

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[-] quick_snail@feddit.nl 10 points 4 months ago

Use monero.

[-] SleepyPie@lemmy.world 8 points 4 months ago

I’ve been a paid protonmail user for years. What should I use instead?

[-] voxel@feddit.uk 11 points 4 months ago

If you don't give information to Proton AG which they can be legally forced to hand over, you're alright.

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[-] AmbitiousProcess@piefed.social 6 points 4 months ago

If you're worried Proton could identify you to authorities, either just make a new Proton account and pay anonymously (cryptocurrency or cash by mail), since that's the only way this person was identified, or you could use what I'd consider to be the next-best, which is Tuta.

Nowhere near as slick a UI, less overall offerings (only email and calendar), but it costs less and generally provides similar security and privacy to Proton. Though again, you'd have to pay via private means, otherwise you're gonna get identified by the same mechanism this person was if the government really decided to come after you by your account.

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[-] hamid@crazypeople.online 8 points 4 months ago

ITT people who believe you have to comply with government orders and call themselves anarchists

[-] Griffus@lemmy.zip 7 points 4 months ago

Being secure online and being anonymous online is not the same. Proton only promises one of those.

[-] Doomsider@lemmy.world 6 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Oh boy, their man fawning over Trump is aging like fine milk.

Proton the company that prides itself protecting privacy when it is literally the law of the country they are in. It is like a cabby advertising that they have license and insurance.

[-] redpulpo@lemmy.world 4 points 4 months ago

Protón don’t promise anonymity If you use your credit card to pay protón services. Maybe he has to learn more about OPSEC. 🤷‍♂️

[-] Doomsider@lemmy.world 5 points 4 months ago

Please, using crypto alone isn't going to do shit. The barrier to entry for truly anonymous usage is not something most people will ever accomplish.

Privacy is effectively dead but yet we have a company trying to advertise about it. Proton has always been marketing garbage meant to attract people's money.

Garbage company with no ethics other than taking care of their pocket book.

[-] redpulpo@lemmy.world 5 points 4 months ago

You’re mixing up privacy and anonymity. Encryption alone doesn’t make you anonymous — that’s true — but Proton never claimed it would. Their promise is that email content is end-to-end encrypted, which is why they can’t hand over the messages themselves.

In the case reported by 404 Media, the identification came from payment information, not from breaking encryption. If you pay with a credit card, your identity is already tied to the account. That would happen with any service under a legal jurisdiction.

The real takeaway isn’t that Proton is “garbage”, it’s that most people misunderstand what encryption actually protects.

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[-] quick_snail@feddit.nl 5 points 4 months ago

They have a .onion site. Use it always.

[-] OccasionallyFeralya@lemmy.ml 8 points 4 months ago

And don’t pay with a credit card if you’re committing crimes lmao

[-] Captainautism@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

I just switched from proton to mailbox. Mailbox gives you a say so over what happens when law enforcement asks for your account info.

IMG-9273.jpg

[-] LytiaNP@lemmy.today 28 points 4 months ago

Mailbox.org doesn't have the option for anonymous payments beyond payments in cash, which was the reason for the article in the first place.

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[-] ToTheGraveMyLove@sh.itjust.works 10 points 4 months ago

That image doesn't say anything about law enforcement tho?

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this post was submitted on 05 Mar 2026
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Privacy

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