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Yes! Finally someone who gets it. Looking for Tor-first paid services to start up. At the end of the day, what Protonmail does just doesn't seem hard. I paid for their service with the mindset that it was temporary to invite better vendors to come along. Looking forward to what's next.

How do you like it? How does it compare to Protonmail?

I've seen the name here a little but first time looking them up. The page title "Secure email: Tutanota..." is super similar to "Secure email: Protonmail..." Even the page layout is similar.

And I'm trying to sign up and the whole flow is super similar to Proton. By design?

Appreciate the suggestion. Solutions like this also caught my interest: https://thehelm.com

(hn discussion from last week: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28350466

from years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18238581)

Incredible that they were able to track down a boring purchase made at WalMart using security footage and Walmart's inventory management system. Yikes.

The full quote is from Minneapolis Fed Chair Neel Kashkari who said on 60 minutes "We have an infinte amount of cash in the federal reserve": https://twitter.com/Vis_in_numeris/status/124190541015780556...

That's a great question, what's your answer?

Oh neat, I haven't seen this before. Can you explain more for the rest of us? I saw it can be a personal email server - but then it started talking about storing everything for me and I lost a bit of interest as that sounds like it's trying to do everything.

edit: for those curious, discussion on HN 3 years ago https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18238581

Can you define what "up front" means to you in this example? Homepage, privacy policy, user agreement, tweets?

Wow neat. Yes this is a challenge with ProtonMail, the search can only go by subject line and recipients as message contents are encrypted.

To your point about privacy not being lucrative, interesting.

Thanks for asking. Your suggestion seems rather extreme, but I'm open to it if you make a good case. I'm curious to see more Tor-first service launch.

1. More blog posts about Tor, how Proton is supporting Tor 2. Updating their Onion link. Their original blog post still refers to a v2 address, which are being retired 3. Supporting Tor broadly for other uses 4. Support anonymous account creation through Tor. I get it, it's hard. Find a solution that doesn't require de-anonymizing users.

Would be curious to see a diff of Proton's privacy policy over the next few weeks.

Assuming people who really use their services are criminals is like assuming someone who cares about a car's details is an illegal street racer.

I use Protonmail to provide tools for journalists, teachers, and whistleblowers, and people who are in danger from folks who mark them "criminals".

You need to think bigger. How could Protonmail make the world a better place in this regard? Promote Tor to users through its blog? Report on Tor usage stats? Enable account creation through Tor without requiring a cell phone?

All of the above and more.

What about what I said suggests anything about not complying with the law? All my suggestions to Protonmail were around transparency and user education. They can host it in China if that's the case for all I care. In the modern age, every state is an adversary.

Oh neat wasn't aware of ethmail.cc will check it out

The users. Who else?

Thought I was pretty clear here. My $$ going to EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) is meant to get me more bang for my buck than using Protonmail.

Thought I was pretty clear here. My $$ going to EFF is meant to get me more bang for my buck than using Protonmail.

I wonder if the future of a company like Protonmail is that it has to be open source. Almost like simply an API, no privacy statement, no marketing, just a smart contract. More like UniSwap.

My threat model is an un-educated population of people who don't value privacy or care about surveillance. I'll put up with shitty tools in the mean time but can only support those who are building a better future.

I would switch to Gmail and donate my $50/year to EFF.

Edited to say I'm open to suggestions here. Given that Protonmail dropped the ball for $60/year, apparently that's not enough to keep them focused. I'm prepared to pay $100/year for email now.

Yes, exactly this.

Proton's first and last blog post about Tor was from 2017 [1]

As a paying customer, I expect better.

[1] https://protonmail.com/blog/tor-encrypted-email/

Yes it's time Protonmail got rid of free accounts. Or disable free accounts so they can't send more than 10 emails a day.

This isn't rocket science, Protonmail. You make it look hard. I'll take my money elsewhere (open to suggestions here).

Figure out how to solve it. People need to be able to create accounts through Tor.

Otherwise I'll just use Gmail it's free.

Disclaimer: Paying Protonmail customer

Proton's first and last blog post about Tor was in 2017. [1]

The CEO today claimed to be a leader with Tor simply because they have a Tor site up.

This is 2021, not 2017. I expect better.

[1] https://protonmail.com/blog/tor-encrypted-email/

Disclaimer: Protonmail customer and considering switching

Wtf are you talking about here? No one expects a service to not be able to take logs or change their host country.

I do expect Protonmail to explain how they have to obey the law and what that looks like. That despite the picture of the Swiss Alps they can be compelled by the Swiss govt.

I do expect Protonmail to tell users about Tor, support Tor, and talk about limitations of Protonmail and Tor.

Sure, you could say this would be bad for business but this whole "security fortress" marketing scheme is unsustainable.

Disclaimer: Paying Protonmail customer

I hear you. But in that case, why not just use Gmail?

For $50/year I do expect Protonmail to be more like a life coach for privacy and surveillance. Not for me personally, but for the people who really need protection. It's just email, I can get it cheap anywhere.

For example, their one and only blog post about Tor is from 2017.

I expect better. Promote Tor on the homepage. Publish about what percentage of your users use Tor. Fight to change norms not just pass the buck.

Get with the times, Protonmail. Or someone else will do it for you.

Proton's homepage needs to say this. They must educate their users to live in the future. Attackers are always getting better.

Why does Protonmail seem stuck in 2017 in their use of Tor?

Same here. The fact that this is the #1 item on their blog post gives me concern as a paying customer.

They cannot and should not guarantee this. It is a losing strategy.

They must educate customers on the limits of Protonmail. Or at least, whoever takes their place will. Protonmail looks DOA at this point.

And more legal requests are coming. Protonmail has a target on its back. That 2/day will soon be 20/day.

That means Protonmail needs to stop training users to "trust us". It's a losing strategy.

Protonmail must educate users to treat it as an adversary. And to still provide a product worth using.

Train users to use Tor. Promote other tools for dissenters.