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Comment by aivisol | Hacker News Reader

Can Switzerland be an option? That's where ProtonMail is located, right?

But again, where Switzerland's cables are connected to? To same 14 eyes I guess.

While I'm not going to disagree Switzerland is an OK option, you have to understand first why ProtonMail choose Switzerland.

One point being "In the US and EU, gag orders can be issued to prevent an individual from knowing they are being investigated or under surveillance. While these type of orders also exist in Switzerland, the prosecutors have an obligation to notify the target of surveillance, and the target has an opportunity to appeal in court. There are no such things as National Security Letters, and all surveillance requests must go through the courts. Furthermore, while Switzerland is party to international assistance treaties, such requests for information must hold up under Swiss law, which has much stricter privacy provisions."

I read this as, it isn't to say a government can't monitor what's going over the pipe for sigint, but if they specifically target a user for surveillance it must be disclosed to them and they have a right to appeal.

Nonetheless, if you're an American connecting to Switzerland for ProtonMail, the US govt will have some sigint, even if it's just your origin -> protonmail destination.

I'd go as far as to argue, as long as all communications are fully encrypted with the best possible encryption available (and no backdoors) it's fairly safe in any country for most general content. If you're extra concerned about privacy and surveillance (like I am), you should host in a country which has strong privacy laws but read up on the privacy laws, most of the time a country has good privacy laws for individuals, companies within the country, not foreigners.

Just my two cents away.

> you have to understand first why ProtonMail choose Switzerland.

A quick look at their Wikipedia page tells me that it was created by people who worked at CERN, and that it is headquartered in Geneva.

So it's possible that the answer could simply be: Because that where the founders live (and it is also more advantageous that neighbouring France).

I'm not saying it's warranted, but I could see there being a lingering perception of "hey, if they were willing to hang onto all that art the Nazis stole for so long they'll probably stay out of my email."

Is that the perception?

Why not:

If they were willing to turn over Jewish assets to the Nazis so easily, despite being "neutral", maybe you can't trust them to keep your stuff safe.

My perception is that the general perception is that the Swiss have a reputation for neutrality, especially in regards to the contents of bank accounts and lock boxes.

Before continuing I want to make it super clear that I'm not endorsing the Nazi's stealing art/gold/whatever. With that said, were Swiss banks handing over assets to the Nazis that had been previously held for Jewish families, or were they only holding assets for the Nazis which the Nazis themselves took from Jewish families? (This question is not intending make one option sound more morally acceptable.) My perception is the latter, but I could be ignorant. If I'm not ignorant (in this domain), I don't see why these events would call into question the ability of the Swiss to securely hold assets.

Well, my recollection was of the former.

That is, I think I read long ago that the confidentiality of Swiss bank accounts was compromised during WWII for the benefit of the Nazis. I thought it was common knowledge.

However, I seem to be having difficulty finding a reference with Google at the moment.

It’s also good marketing to invoke Swiss privacy voodoo as a market differentiator. “Your email securely stored in France,” just doesn’t have the same ring to it.

People really have an unhealthy fascination with SIGINT. It's really not the disproportionate threat people think it is, or should be most concerned with. Tools such as encryption, privacy-focused messaging mediums, VPNs, etc might serve to complicate an investigation by local law-enforcement agencies, but will not be able to defend against a more sophisticated targeted attack. While absolutely best practice, this is analogous to using an armored car to deliver messages from someone living on a park bench to someone living in a cardboard box. I absolutely agree with the use of these tools, as long as you know their limitations and the threat profile they're targeted against. A messaging medium that does not store chat history will absolutely aid you in the event that your phone/computer is seized by law-enforcement to be forensically examined. However, the biggest problem is the endpoints. Using a zero-day/backdoor to root a device on the end of the messaging chain is orders of magnitude easier than trying to break encryption. Why bother using all that computing power when you can just use a rootkit to read the screen buffer in real-time? You might be using all the best encryption tools, etc... but if SIGINT is really what you're concerned about then you'd be best off treating your PC/Phone as being the chief vulnerability.

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