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Comment by rawbot | Hacker News Reader

So they "don't log your IP", until the first time someone challenged that statement. Talk is cheap.

ProtonMail has always said that they would comply with Swiss law. Your IP will not be logged unless you commit a crime in Switzerland and the swiss police hands in a request.

So... if they receive valid swiss court order they can be forced to log user passwords on demand and their entire service is then useless? As when you have password you can decrypt entire mailbox content.

They market their service to journalists and activists, which are often targetted by their own governments. Seems that they cannot protect any of them.

Be real for a second: if a government targets you, you have no way of escaping it. If you're targeted by a small country, with not much power, so your only real options are kidnapping you if you are ever in said country. So, moving away does keep you safe. Should be, say, a Chilean journalist reporting on wrong deeds in your own country, you can safely assume that ProtonMail is safe for you. (That is, unless the government knows who you are).

But a first world country ? They have laws, they have international influence, they have technical means and the ability to intervene wherever you are.

"Basically, you’re either dealing with Mossad or not-Mossad. If your adversary is not-Mossad, then you’ll probably be fine if you pick a good password and don’t respond to emails from ChEaPestPAiNPi11s@virus-basket.biz.ru. If your adversary is the Mossad, YOU’RE GONNA DIE AND THERE’S NOTHING THAT YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT. The Mossad is not intimidated by the fact that you employ https://. If the Mossad wants your data, they’re going to use a drone to replace your cellphone with a piece of uranium that’s shaped like a cellphone, and when you die of tumors filled with tumors, they’re going to hold a press conference and say “It wasn’t us” as they wear t-shirts that say “IT WAS DEFINITELY US,” and then they’re going to buy all of your stuff at your estate sale so that they can directly look at the photos of your vacation instead of reading your insipid emails about them. In summary, https:// and two dollars will get you a bus ticket to nowhere. Also, SANTA CLAUS ISN’T REAL. When it rains, it pours." - https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/08/mickens_on_se...

This applies to ProtonMail too. What do you think happened with Lavabit ? They were pretending full security too, and we all know what happened.

Stop thinking this is a problem technology can fix.

Note that the recent case involved a crime in France.

So really, it's more like 'unless you commit a crime in a country that cooperates with Switzerland and the Swiss legal system decides to hand in a request'

Their actions were illegal in Switzerland too. As much as I can criticize France's recent actions against protesters, in this case, it's the Swiss justice system that ultimately decided to comply with the request.

Yeah, I understand that it was illegal in Switzerland, and the Swiss authority was not a passive participant, but your wording 'unless you commit a crime in Switzerland' implies that the crime itself is committed in Switzerland, not that it could be an action contrary to Swiss law in any cooperating country.

> unless you commit a crime

Right, because the police would never persecute someone who didn't commit a crime, is that right?

Until yesterday their homepage said "By default, we do not keep any IP logs".

That was unclear and has now been removed.

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