this post was submitted on 10 Apr 2025
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Proton CEO Andy Yen gave a surprisingly sharp interview to the Swiss magazine "watson" (source in German: https://www.watson.ch/digital/wirtschaft/517198902-proton-schweiz-chef-andy-yen-zum-ausbau-der-staatlichen-ueberwachung). He warned that Proton might leave Switzerland if new surveillance laws are passed, which aligns with the company’s strong pro-privacy stance. So far, nothing unexpected.

However, Yen’s remarks about Swiss officials - describing them as lifelong bureaucrats, all lazy, and incompetent - came across as arrogant and out of place, almost like something you’d expect from a capitalism praising Trump supporter. he also was quoted in the interview, that the US works better (so they consider to move there?).

The interview left me speechless, and I’m certain I won’t be considering Proton for any of my future projects

Source

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 6 days ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Most of the links in that list fail or lead to http rather than https. The point about Radware links to an archived webpage that states that proton no longer works with them. Storing Emails as .eml seems to be a rather arbitrary critique. Criticizing Proton for operating in Switzerland because of Swiss laws also seems odd, when the very article you are positing it under is criticizing Swiss laws changing further to make them consider relocation.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago

You know…. You may be right. But I honestly don't have the time, patience or willingness to dig further into companies anymore.

My tolerance for brands now is absolute ZERO. I don’t care anymore. One tiny tiny small fuckup, mistake, wrong worded phrase and you end up in my blacklist. It’s unfair? Oh no… ahaha

Proton can fail, Andy and all the employees can be jobless and homeless for what concerns me. Too harsh? Good, quit then, distance yourself.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 days ago

i don't understand why the proton board doesn't sack him

i also don't understand why he's praising a surveillance state like the us which is currently deporting people because they're critical of foreign governments

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

I hope that this is only a few misguided bureaucrats of the ÜPF, who wake up and notice that they make a big mistake.

I've only skimmed but it seems he's only angry at specific bureaucrats. I don't see anything too outrageous.

I suspect that computer scientists have a tendency to believe that all complex problems can simply be broken down into many small parts and solved once and for all. But that is because they enjoy thinking that way for writing code or solving computer problems, and they are not educated at all in sociology, economy, psychology or political science. There are those who seek power above anything else - and that is why we can't have nice things or simple solutions.

He does come across a bit like a libertarian nutjob as if it's up to the "captains of industry" to fight crime and care for the well-being of people. Except of course about the surveillance area he is right, the surveillance state has always and will always overreach. And organized crime and terrorists can always circumvent legal means of surveillance by faking or stealing identities.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 days ago (1 children)

I left to Tuta when he got unnecessarily political last time, and it's been pretty great.

Also, they just dropped a calendar widget yesterday ;)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 days ago

tuta and mullvad has been my goto since the proton implosion

[–] [email protected] 49 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I read the entire interview, and while it was a browser translation, I didn't get the same sense from it as OP. It reads to me like standard commentary from someone who works in secure services.

The comment about the US was more about the fact that they wouldn't have the same obligations to expose users or implement backdoors as what this regulation is asking, and that's true. The US is still (thankfully) supportive of E2EE services. How long that lasts is unknown, but it is still nonetheless true right now.

And calling the politicians lazy bureaucrats, etc.? I call Democrats stuff like that all the time.

He's said some other potentially problematic things, depending on how you read them, but this seems pretty innocuous and in line with what I'd expect from someone in his position.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 week ago

Bereaucrats being lazy is a common theme, for a reason. I don't get people who act like this isn't a well-known common issue, in pretty much any government.

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

This is a thinly-veiled attempt at leveraging his past comments to make a normal boring interview seem like a firecracker. Disingenuous as fuck, from title yo body.

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I don't see anything wrong here, calling bureaucrats lazy has absolutely nothing to do with Trump. I call then all the time lazy and useless in my country.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 week ago (13 children)

In the US at least, federal employees are non-political employees who have protections against getting randomly fired, so a new politician can't replace the entire workforce with loyal idealogues. Federal employees earn less income than workers in the private sector, but do it for the sense of purpose and the stability.

Insulting bureaucrats as "lazy" on the whole is the first step to removing those protections, and going back to the world of Andrew Jackson and the robber barons, before these rules existed. Where the regulators can be fired for any reason and replaced with staff that are friendly to business, or not replaced at all. This led to huge wealth disparities, deregulation, a global depression, and the wealthy mostly remained unarmed.

So while calling government workers "lazy bureaucrats" seems harmless, in the USA at least it is part of an influence campaign to dismantle and despoil the government.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 days ago

This has nothing to do with the US. It's an interview in the Swiss media, of a Swiss-based company.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 week ago (5 children)

I'll never understand the hate boner people on the internet have for this guy.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 week ago

a good alternative to protonmail for secure encrypted email communication is Delta Chat: https://delta.chat/

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I'm using Proton and considering divesting. What are good alternatives without US ties?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I don't think there's any all-in-one services like Proton. [email protected] has a few suggestions, https://european-alternatives.eu/ has others. You'll likely have to piecemeal things if you had the full Proton suite.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I'm only using the email though so it is not a hard transition.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago

Only using one company per service is probably the wisest option, regardless of which company it is!

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 week ago

Then Tuta or Mailbox.org are often recommended. I use Tuta + Addy.io to give me a bunch of aliases, though if you pay for one of the mail services, they both give you a number of aliases, too.

[–] skozzii 6 points 1 week ago (12 children)

Glad I went with Tuta mail.

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Such a shame to see what seemed like a great alternative to Gmail under such management.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

source: [removed]

I assume this is poster's seelf deletion because otherwise more of the post would be gone including title and creator. is this a smear campaign?

I mean, things we have seen in the past does not inspire a lot of trust, but what is this?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 days ago

On my side it's

Post is awaiting moderator approval.

I don't know exactly what that means, but it doesn't appear like the person who wrote it meant to delete it, or avoid criticism about it

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