Proton CEO goes full MAGA
Proton CEO goes full MAGA
When called out on it, they then doubled down on this dogshit take: https://archive.ph/quYyb
Cancelled my yearly subscription. Mozilla, for all its faults, is at least doing things for a better and more open internet that provides a semblance of privacy. Most importantly they are smart enough to not bootlick in public.
Gonna migrate my passwords to Mozilla pass manager and move my vpn to something like Mozilla vpn or mullvad or something.
Official statement from Proton, after I filed a complaint:
Hello, Thank you for contacting us. We appreciate you reaching out, please be informed that we have shared a response to the community feedback which can be found here: https://www.reddit.com/r/ProtonMail/comments/1i2nz9v/on_politics_and_proton_a_message_from_andy/ We hope you find this information helpful. Should you have any further issues, questions or perhaps a concern that you'd like us to address, please do not hesitate to let us know.
Kind regards,
Ethan Customer Support Proton Mail
My response:
Hi,
Thank you for your response. I wish this would clarify everything, however, the comments he made on Reddit were done with the official Proton admin account, therefore making his personal comments an official Proton statement. https://snoo.habedieeh.re/r/ProtonMail/comments/1i1zjgn/comment/m7ahrlm/ Next to the fact that he posted his personal believes as an official Proton statement, the claims he made are factual untrue, making Proton spread fake news (as noted in the comments under Yen his statement). If it indeed it is just his personal opinion, he should have posted everything from his personal account only.
I have my personal opinion which I don't mind sharing with others, but I won't use a company account to make these claims as that could get me fired.
Andy Yen didn't make Proton a part of his opinion by just sharing it, but by sharing it as Proton. I believe Proton should take action if Proton doesn't want to be affiliated with Yen his personal opinions and with the fake news he spreads.
I would like to know what Proton will do about this incident and how Proton will ensure this doesn't happen again in the future as incidents like these make Proton look unprofessional and breaks trust with its customer base, one which holds privacy and security high. When the CEO is so easy to manipulate by populists and fake news from another country and makes this official Proton statements, how can the company ensure what it stands for.
Kind regards,
W
Here's what he said in Reddit
Source: https://snoo.habedieeh.re/r/ProtonMail/comments/1i1zjgn/comment/m7ahrlm/
Andy here, since it's my original post that's being reposted here, let me comment further.
My post is talking about Gail Slater, who is by all measures, actually a good pick, with a solid track record of being on the right side of the antitrust issue. Yes, she happens to be nominated by Trump, but her record speaks for itself.
This is not going to be a popular opinion, but on the specific issue of antitrust, Democrats fell short. In 2022, we campaigned extensively in the US for anti-trust legislation. Two bills were ready, with bipartisan support. Chuck Schumer (who coincidently has two daughters working as big tech lobbyists) refused to bring the bills for a vote. In the aftermath of this failure, great people like former Democratic rep David Cicilline left congress, leaving few strong voices for antitrust left in the Democratic party. In the meantime, at a 2024 event covering antitrust remedies, out of all the invited senators, just a single one showed up - JD Vance.
By working on the front lines of many policy issues, we have seen the shift between Dems and Republicans over the past decade first hand. And that's a missed opportunity for Dems, because by and large, support for cracking down on corporate monopolies is popular on both sides of the political spectrum. Unfortunately, corporate capture of Dems is real and in the end money won. It is hard to see how this changes, and Republicans are likely to lead the antitrust charge in the coming years.
From that perspective, and going back to my original post, Gail is a great pick. One should not equate our support of Gail for Proton not being neutral anymore. We continue to call out bad behavior from both sides, whether it's Dems or Republicans, on our core issues. Just a few weeks ago, we were called out for being in bed with Soros because we gave money to too many "liberal" organizations: https://proton.me/blog/2024-lifetime-fundraiser-results No, the Proton Foundation isn't the new Soros either (even if we may coincidentally fund some of the same things sometimes). We simply stick with our strongly held core believes, and leave politics out of it, because the issues we care about, should be apolitical.
UPDATE: I posted another comment further below in response to a user, but I'll reproduce it here for completeness:
I don't really want to wade further into what is obviously a very polarizing political topic, but since you are asking for some thoughts, I can share.
We have been fighting big corporate interests since the very beginning. People have short memories, so few remember that in 2019 and 2020, we were working with congressional Democrats on this issue. We're even cited a dozen times in the report, which by the way, was partially authored by Lina Khan, who at that time worked with Ciciline. This is the report here: https://proton.me/blog/congress-antitrust-report
The American Innovation and Choice Online Act (AICOA) was also mentioned. Guess what, we supported that too: https://proton.me/blog/congress-stand-up-to-big-tech More than with blog posts, I personally was on Capitol Hill trying to convince senators who were on the fence, on both the Democratic and Republican side. The votes where there, but in 2022, Democrats controlled the Senate, and ultimately Sen. Schumer decided what gets to be voted on, and as we know, AICOA was not advanced.
Epic vs Apple was also mentioned. Well, we supported that one too. In fact, we were one of the founding companies of the Coalition for App Fairness, along with, yes, Epic: https://proton.me/blog/coalition-for-app-fairness
The point I am trying to make is, in the past 10 years, our position on corporate monopolies has not moved. But US politics has shifted, and the parties themselves have moved. We're huge supporters of Lina Khan and her work. But you know who else agrees with Lina Khan on Big Tech? Actually, JD Vance, as he's publicly stated: https://fortune.com/2024/08/11/jd-vance-5000-child-tax-credit-support-ftc-lina-khan-tech-regulation/ Can you imagine the Republican Vice Presidents of the past taking this position?
It is not a bad thing that Republicans have moved so far on this issue, and are now in a position to go even further than Democrats have managed in the past four years. It's a good thing, and something that should be welcomed irrespective of your political leanings. Ultimately, we will judge actions, but for now, I am supportive of Gail Slater, just as I was supportive of Lina Khan. And honestly, it should not matter that one is a Republican, and the other is a Democrat.
When people "turn" conservative the things they say never make sense. It's like they've been slowly turning into a subhuman and something happened to exist right when their mind reached out for an explanation.
I'm a huge fucking racist piece of shit... because David Lynch died! LOOK AT ME!
Wow, lots of people on Lemmy just look at screenshots of text and dont read anything anymore.
I dont think he said anything controversial. Read what he wrote.
He's not supporting Trump or the Republican party in general. He is calling them out for selecting someone good on antitrust. That's not controversial.
Wait, so his solution to abuse in big tech is...hiring someone who formerly worked in big tech...? Okay...
Oh shit he was a Trump apologist already in 2016. Look at this awesome whataboutism.
https://proton.me/blog/trump-control-nsa-privacy
It is not Trump’s fault
It is tempting to blame all this on Trump, but that is taking the easy way out. All Trump does is put a new face on the existing privacy problem, so now it concerns a segment of the population that previously didn’t care as much. Proton Mail users have always come from both the left and right side of the political spectrum. Today, we are seeing an influx of liberal users, but Proton Mail has also long been popular with the political right, who were truly worried about big government spying, and the Obama administration having access to their communications. Now the tables have turned.
The same terror the political right has experienced is now being felt in liberal bubbles such as Silicon Valley for the first time. The left is correct to be terrified of a Trump-led NSA snooping on their communications, especially since Silicon Valley giants like Google and Facebook can be forced to spy on users on behalf of Trump’s NSA. However, this precedent was not set by Trump – he hasn’t even taken office yet. The first major incident of a US tech giant being complicit in US government spying actually took place in 2015 under the Obama administration(new window).
Can someone remind me about the terror campaigns we had against the political right before Trump was elected?
People forget that the current antitrust actions against Big Tech were started under the first Trump admin.
So shut the fuck up Andy, you're out of your element.
I am a little confused by this because I think they're kind of technically right?
Democrat corporate interest will absolutely keep them from going after big tech. Maybe they think and ponder about some antitrust stuff, to save face, but it comes to nothing. Any significant change we've had recently has come from legislation in the EU.
Republicans are absolutely more likely to go after big tech than Democrats. But it's not because they're altruistic or down to help the scrappy little guy. They're petty. They hold grudges. They're still mad tech companies clamped down on them over Covid. But, they haven't been bribed yet, but once they are, this goes away.
That's why all these contributions are coming into the inauguration fund. There's more to come.
But that only works on the Republicans who haven't drunk the Koolaid, and there are more and more Republican politicians who drink as much Koolaid as they possibly can. They're not the classic grifters taking advantage of their constituents, they're diehard believers, and that's way scarier. They're the most likely to retaliate against big tech.
I guess the "Trump supports the little guy," take is bad, but the "Republicans are more likely to hurt big tech," is not. Never underestimate pettiness.
I was just permabanned for making this comment.
Reddit is in full censorship mode over this. Oh well not the first time, certainly not the last.
Enshittification in high gear mode. The other day they've been exposed for backpedalling on their promises to spare inactive accounts that were created before 2024 until next year from the inactive accounts deletion policy.
Can Trump's incoming administration really be said to stand "for the little guys" when it's full of millionaires and billionaires?
I'll be leaving Proton fucking immediately.
Way different stance than 8 years ago.
For my fellow German readers: An affordable green alternative to Proton hosted in Berlin is Posteo. https://posteo.de 1€ / month to have your mail hosted by a non-shitty company is a small price.
Well thats a fuckin shame.
Good to know. Bye Proton.
Using language like "the tables have completely turned is unforgivable".
He needs to go, or we all leave the platform.
I wouldn't say he's being "Maga", but this is some "Libertarian" dumb fuck that has no clue what's happeneing in politics.
If you scroll through his twitter, he did praise some things that Biden did, so it seems like he might just be bootlicking whoever is in power as appeasement
Edit: He also seems to be pro-Ukraine and supports the activists in Hong Kong, so basically a Libertarian that leans to the political right. (And also being a huge dumbass)
What Trump really means here is "big tech has run amok they need to kiss my ring first and then they can do whatever the fuck they like". He has identified big tech companies as a key component to cement his future dictatorship and he is not wrong.
Toeing the party li(n)e.
Little guys? Like Coca Cola?
cancelled today. I have a few months to find alternatives. I've been a paying customer for years. Proton has always been a bit buggy but it was worth it I thought. bowing down to tRump is a deal breaker.
I hope you all see thru Trump's Big Tech bullshit. It's not to reign them in to make America competitive - or whatever other horseshit he spews out of that asshole he calls a mouth. It's to get rid of the others so that he controls and censors the fuck out of the only avenue of social communication like his handlers.
I wouldn’t say he embraced Trump, I’d say he is pro-breaking big tech, since that would probably help Proton.
Bernie Sanders even came out and said “hey, if Trump wants to cap credit card interest rates, I’m with him on that.”
Trump says a lot of shit to appeal to working class people. I don’t disagree with reminding him of what he said and holding him to those things, if he’s now going to be president.
Fucking pathetic
I think people are taking this stuff too personally - between zuck and these other tech ceos caving to the right wing social politics.
Fact is trump won the election, and hes the dictator of the usa now. He has legal immunity and the ability to kill anyone he wants officially, as well as full party control of all 3 branches of govt and the governers. He could scrap the constitution if he wanted to, all hed have to do is privately threaten to assasinate anyone that doesnt go along with his plans.
A private conversation has likely happened with these CEOs that effectively went "you need to help us maintain control of the govt or were going to take measures against you."
Its nothing personal, for all we know their lives are literally on the line.
For all the talk abt small govt. The republicans have made the usa the most powerful federal govt of any western nation.
That the democrats don't stand for the little guys anymore is something I agree with, but to then say the republicans do is wild
I... very much do not like this. But the reality is that tech companies are FULL of libertarian tech bro types who only care about "policy" as it equates to their bottom line. And a LOT of companies are going to suck up to trump in the hopes of not being made an example of by the wannabe mafia administration. And the follow up response is still bullshit but it is useful idiot bullshit, if that makes sense.
Gonna look for alternatives but not optimistic.
That's a pity. I was looking for a service to jump to from my current email and VPN. They were the top candidate but not in consideration now lol.
I was thinking about perhaps moving things to Proton, being European and all, and touting privacy etc. Looks like that won’t happen.
Maybe he hit his head or has been replaced by bizarro Andy yen. In any case I can't believe he would do this to his own company. I started to give him the benefit of the doubt until he updated his statement saying that JD Vance cares about privacy and antitrust... I was like bro okay in done.
Already cancelled my yearly renewal. I'll switch to Mullvad and save some money anyways. Never really used Proton Mail, drive, calendar, etc but I wanted to support them.
I have a paid Proton account but never fully switched from Google services. I guess that's a silver lining.
Damn, not a great start to 2025 but I guess migrating away from Proton will be this month's project.
Goddammit, and I just signed up for a Duo account during their sale last year to try and de-google me and my partner's life.
Ugh, I guess it's still better than Google too, but I won't be migrating to their password manager or vpn. Now I have to fully anticipate leaving Proton ASAP as well. It's even more of a pita for my partner though, she's not a techie, part of the proton appeal was that the apps and integrations make switching convenient for her.
So fucking typical, I miss the "Don't be evil" days when engineers at least pretended to care about social issues and sometimes even actually did.
We should collectively rename them to sometime like Protrum Mail, or alternatively Protoff Mail.
This wouldn't have anything to do with US internet restrictions would it? Like how multiple states place age verification on porn sites? Like how more restrictions would pop up in a MAGA admin to keep it "safe".
That wouldn't benefit Proton at all now would it? They don't serve a product that would circumvent those restrictions right? A product they sell?
Damn, disappointing.
Damn, and I just switched to proton because they have port forwarding and moderate NAT so that I can effectively seed torrents.
Another one to the list!
Wonder if he'll change his tune when Trump starts going after people using their messages?
Ughh
patiently waiting for Eppie
Now's probably not a bad time to mention I've used fastmail for years and it's great.
archive.pH doesn't load. Mastodon thread doesn't load. Anyone got an archive we can actually load?
