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The IT company Mullvad’s founder Daniel Berntsson is behind a giant donation to the populist Örebro Party, which advocates “comprehensive re-immigration” from Sweden. “It’s sad that it’s needed,” he told Flamman.

~ https://www.flamman.se/techprofil-ger-miljoner-till-orebropartiet/

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[-] ZombieCyborgFromOuterSpace@piefed.ca 5 points 28 minutes ago

You know who hasn't given money to far right extremists? Proton and it's founder.

I remember when people went ape shit because the CEO, Andy Yen, approved of one of Trump's pick for the antitrust division.

Then the antitrust pick happened to be good at her job, so Trump fired her and people realized Andy wasn't so wrong after all but still hated him.

Everytime I tried to defend Proton, I got downvoted and insulted over this. Got called a MAGAt and a neo nazi sympethizer. I was told to use Mullvad and that it was so much better and I wouldn't be encouraging some right wing sympathizer even though Andy Yen never took any political stance.

Well who's laughing now?

[-] Hund@feddit.nu 2 points 11 minutes ago* (last edited 11 minutes ago)

Proton has sponsored some French (?) rasist person recently. They have apologised for it and said it was a mistake. However. This is not the first stupid thing they've done.

PS. I'm no way a fanboy of anything. While I have been a Mullvad user for multiple years now, it seems like I have to reconsider that.

[-] Seimhe@lemmy.world 12 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 35 minutes ago)

The five million from Berntsson make up the majority – as much as 72 percent – ​​of the Örebro Party's income last year. It is also the largest single private donation to a party in 2025.

The money also seems to have been the triggering factor for the party's decision to stand in the parliamentary elections.

(machine translation)

Fuck them. Not sure who to go with now. Paying monthly and not needing to remember to cancel were the main reason I used them.

Also, it seems safer to assume that all tech companies are rotten until proven otherwise.

[-] fox2263@lemmy.world 13 points 1 hour ago

Oh for fucks sake is nothing sacred

[-] ZC3rr0r@piefed.ca 31 points 2 hours ago

As a Swede - fuck that guy and the fucking Neo Nazis coming out of the goddamn woodwork everywhere. I was all-in on Mullvad, but that's changing today. Anyone got a good recommendation for a DNS over HTTPS alternative that's not owned by a racist/Nazi/Fascist asshole?

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[-] lemmyng@lemmy.world 9 points 1 hour ago

FUCK, THAT MEANS I GOTTA GET RID OF MULLVAD VPN!

Any FOSS VPNs on F-Droid I should consider?

[-] Hund@feddit.nu 1 points 6 minutes ago

You shouldn't use a VPN provider that doesn't let you use Wireguard. If they require you to use their own client, they're either up to no good or just dumb and shouldn't be in this business to begin with.

[-] brucethemoose@lemmy.world 1 points 31 minutes ago* (last edited 30 minutes ago)

It's kinda an interesting platform. I wouldn't call it purely far right, they dip from many different buckets:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%96rebro_Party

The party claims to stand for a "class-conscious populism" which according to party leader Markus Allard takes inspiration from marxist ideology[32] and unites the "productive" classes of society against the "Transferiat", with the "Transferiat" being a term coined by Allard to describe the classes of society that lives off of transfers that are a net negative for society such as those who, despite having an ability to work, live off of social welfare benefits, as well as those who work "made-up services"[33] that the party deems serve no societal function, such as bureaucrats, consultants, public sector communications specialists, strategists and HR-specialists.[34] The party and its leader Markus Allard strongly criticize the "Transferiat" and argues it needs to be abolished as it "sucks money out of the state".[35] The party differs from modern day left-wing parties by seeing the working class as co-dependent with people working in enterprise and business and instead sees the classes that "lives off of transfers", as specified, as a large economic net-negative and an obstacle for a functional society.

The Örebro party support making plebiscites easier to enact and more potent, increased social housing,[38] subsidies for youth recreation,[22] and free dental care.[39] The party advocates for remigration policies, strong secularism, and assimilationist policies such as immediate closure of the Islamic charter schools.[40][41][42] It opposes continued privatization of health care, elderly care, public housing and municipal education, among other things. During the 2018–2022 term, the party has opposed prestige public projects it considers wasteful, such as the proposed Palace of Culture and bus rapid transit.[43][44]

Markus Allard initiated heavy debate in 2025 by claiming that Sweden is "the land for/belongs to the Swedes" and that the Örebro party favors a large scale remigration policy. He also criticized the Sweden Democrats for, according to him, allowing too many immigrants into the country under their watch as confidence and supply to the Kristersson cabinet.

In 2026 ÖP party leader Markus Allard sparked controversy on several occasions. In a debate hosted by Studio3 with Liberal member of parliament Martin Melin, Allard asked: "why won't the Liberals push for deporting 100 000 social welfare-Somalis?" and in the same debate said that "Sweden belongs to the Swedes. We have to make sure that we take care of our own damn people and we must deport these damn parasites who sit and live at our expense."

In a podcast in May 2026 Allard clarifies some positions that his party holds and among other things made clear that leaving the EU and NATO were on the table for ÖP. Regarding NATO Allard claimed that Sweden cannot trust or rely on NATO and that the country should instead seek to massively increase its weapons production and also become a major arms exporter, arguing it would benefit the Swedish economy.

Not that I agree with it or anything.

But I can kinda see how a ultra-private VPN founder could be in it.

[-] Maroon@lemmy.world 89 points 3 hours ago

God bloody dammit. I genuinely LOVE Mullvad and have tried to use their (not so cheap) services. I feel in this economy, privacy comes at a price and I was happy to do this.

Now, I realise my money is going to fund a POS far-right asshole.

Proton supports Trump.

Mullvad suports the far right.

Is there any major privacy respective service provider that isn't a bloody cunt?

[-] Sanguine@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 49 minutes ago

Can we stop with the "proton" supports trump. This has been echoing since the tweet. I understand the initial recoil, I had it myself, but proton as an entity very clearly does not support trump.

[-] Crozekiel@lemmy.zip 10 points 41 minutes ago

By that logic, Mullvad is fine too, because the entity doesn't support the far right. You are just sending your money to the company which pays the people that do... so...

[-] Flatworm7591@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 1 hour ago

Fuck me, this is gonna ruin mullvad, I hope. Never saw it coming though, wtf?

[-] Z745812939054@lemmy.zip 34 points 3 hours ago

also thought mullvad was legit. also want to know if there's any alternative

[-] HelloRoot@lemy.lol 1 points 33 minutes ago
[-] artifex@piefed.social 7 points 2 hours ago

I’ve semi-seriously been thinking about bootstrapping a VPN service just to have one “not an asshole” service (and that’s setting the bar low - I’m definitely an asshole, just not that kind of asshole). But I’m also a US citizen living in the US, so not the best choice for the job either.

[-] SCmSTR 12 points 3 hours ago

If you build it, they will come

[-] TWeaK@lemmy.today 7 points 3 hours ago
[-] scytale@piefed.zip 2 points 36 minutes ago

Are you able to get through geo-restrictions on streaming services with IVPN?

[-] TWeaK@lemmy.today 17 points 3 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

Signal was kickstarted by the CIA, so dissidents in regimes they wanted to topple could communicate securely, but at least that seems genuine.

Matrix was an Israeli spy company's invention.

Telegram is Russian.

Reddit started out as the creation of Aaron Schwartz, but he got demonised and committed suicide. Then it was left to that shit eater spez, who sold his soul to the Epstein crowd making Ghislaine Maxwell a powermod among others, also hosting r/the_donald and bridging Trump's popularity from 4chan into the mainstream. Now he sells everyone's data to Google, while still not paying the manufacturers of that data anything.

TrueCrypt got shut down because it was too cool.

[-] phase@lemmy.8th.world 1 points 36 minutes ago

And Veracrypt?

[-] electric_nan@lemmy.ml 9 points 3 hours ago

Do you have Signal confused with TOR?

[-] TWeaK@lemmy.today 5 points 3 hours ago

No lol but I guess they did it twice?

It was in the news a year or few ago that the CIA was ceasing its funding of Signal.

[-] whaleross@lemmy.world 4 points 2 hours ago
[-] Mooserider@lemmy.world 23 points 3 hours ago

Okay, so no Mullvad, no Proton, no NordVPN... What's left that's not gross or double plus ungood?

[-] uninvitedguest@piefed.ca 3 points 1 hour ago
[-] microcapybara@sopuli.xyz 1 points 1 hour ago

Windscribe?

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[-] homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world 35 points 4 hours ago

IT company Mullvad founder Daniel Berntsson is behind a huge donation to the populist Örebro Party, which advocates “comprehensive remigration” from Sweden. “It’s sad that it’s needed,” he tells Flamman.

Five million kronor. That's how much money the populist Örebro Party received in 2025 – from a single person. This is shown in the party's income statement, which Flamman has reviewed.

Behind the giant donation is Daniel Berntsson, founder and co-owner of the internationally successful IT company Mullvad.

"This is a donation from me personally," he writes in an email to Flamman.

The company has made large profits in recent years through the sale of so-called VPN services, which make it possible to surf anonymously. In 2024, the company had a turnover of 314 million kronor.

The five million from Berntsson constitutes the majority – a full 72 percent – ​​of the Örebro Party's income last year. It is also the largest single private donation to a party in 2025. ———————————————

That’s the entirety of the article the toot references. No idea what it means.

[-] ambitiousslab@feddit.uk 32 points 3 hours ago

The main part is the party's support for so-called "remigration", which is

ethnic cleansing[1] via mass deportation of non-white minority populations, especially immigrants and sometimes including native-born citizens, to their place of racial ancestry

About the immigration policy of the party:

Markus Allard initiated heavy debate in 2025 by claiming that Sweden is "the land for/belongs to the Swedes" and that the Örebro party favors a large scale remigration policy. He also criticized the Sweden Democrats for, according to him, allowing too many immigrants into the country under their watch as confidence and supply to the Kristersson cabinet.

In 2026 ÖP party leader Markus Allard sparked controversy on several occasions. In a debate hosted by Studio3 with Liberal member of parliament Martin Melin, Allard asked: "why won't the Liberals push for deporting 100 000 social welfare-Somalis?" and in the same debate said that "Sweden belongs to the Swedes. We have to make sure that we take care of our own damn people and we must deport these damn parasites who sit and live at our expense." [45]

In a podcast segment about immigration and deportations Allard stated his opinion and said that "They will also be forced to leave, even if they are born in Sweden, because they have no natural connection to Sweden. They are not Swedish." [46]

About the foreign policy of the party:

In a podcast in May 2026 Allard clarifies some positions that his party holds and among other things made clear that leaving the EU and NATO were on the table for ÖP. Regarding NATO Allard claimed that Sweden cannot trust or rely on NATO and that the country should instead seek to massively increase its weapons production and also become a major arms exporter, arguing it would benefit the Swedish economy.[47][48]

[-] TWeaK@lemmy.today 26 points 3 hours ago

Allard stated his opinion and said that “They will also be forced to leave, even if they are born in Sweden, because they have no natural connection to Sweden. They are not Swedish.”

Lol how is being born somewhere not a natural connection???

[-] Prior_Industry@lemmy.world 17 points 2 hours ago

Also how far do you go back? What’s the magic number? Cos at some point pretty much everyone’s is an immigrant to their country.

[-] MasterBlaster@lemmy.world 2 points 1 hour ago

I just had a surreal vision of Trump sending the whole state of Minnesota to Norway and Sweden.

[-] mumblerfish@lemmy.world 4 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

Well, according to the Sweden Democrats, the far right party the government collaborates with and their youtube channel (which they have allegedly cut ties with, but that proved to be a lie a while back) that also gave Allard his own show, had a program worrying about "third generation" immigrants, when talking about who is "great replacement" replacing Swedes.

Thats right, in a program where they were talking about how every single one with two foreign born parents and half (because "that seems fair", they said in the program) of those with a single foreign born parent are paricipating in a replacement conspiracy, they at the same time worried about the great gap in the statistics that does not keep track on who is third generation immigrants, so the replacement is even greater than that.

How far? If you've got a you got a grandpa with a sun tan you might be impure to these fucks. But our government thinks they are fine people.

Edit, oh yeah, the native Sami people and Jews are not Swedish to them either. They have doubled down on this many times.

[-] TWeaK@lemmy.today 4 points 2 hours ago

Maybe it's only okay if you're kidnapped by a viking XD

[-] Prior_Industry@lemmy.world 6 points 2 hours ago

Sounds like you entered the country via a small boat if that was the case. Sorry gotta throw those back.

[-] whaleross@lemmy.world 47 points 4 hours ago

Disappointing.

[-] sickday@fedia.io 1 points 1 hour ago

Guess I'm going back to AzireVPN.

[-] itrealgood@mander.xyz 19 points 4 hours ago

Shit. So proton vpn it is? Their ceo is also not amazing, I heard. But doesn't sound as bad as this mullvad debacle

[-] Wildmimic@anarchist.nexus 20 points 4 hours ago

He had some bad ideas, but hasn't yet been caught financing fascism if i remember correctly

[-] XLE@piefed.social 3 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

He talked up the Trump administration when he should have known better, but talking them up is not as extreme as funding them. I think. YMMV.

[-] Hund@feddit.nu 10 points 3 hours ago

Proton has done some questionable things as well. The most recent is this.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48446899

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this post was submitted on 26 Jun 2026
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