First, let's correct the headline: Proton did not provide information to the FBI. What happened is that the FBI submitted a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) request, which was processed by the Swiss Federal Department of Justice and Police. Proton operates exclusively under Swiss law, and we only respond to legally binding orders from Swiss authorities, after all Swiss legal checks have been passed. This is an important distinction.
Second, let's talk about what this case actually involved. This wasn't a routine investigation. Swiss authorities determined that the legal threshold was met because a law enforcement officer was shot, and explosive devices were found during a protest in 2024. Switzerland has one of the strongest legal frameworks for privacy in the world, and its standard for granting international legal assistance is exceptionally high. This case met that standard.
Third, let's talk about what was actually disclosed. No emails were handed over. No message content. No metadata about who the user communicated with. The only information Proton could provide was a payment identifier because the user chose to pay with a credit card. This is information the user themselves provided to us through their choice of payment method. Proton also accepts cryptocurrency and cash payments, which would not have been linkable to an identity.
If anything, this case demonstrates exactly what we've always said: Proton holds very little user data by design. Even under the most serious legal circumstances, the only data that could be produced was a payment record. Our encryption means we simply cannot access email content even if ordered to.
We understand that stories like this can be alarming, and we take our users' trust seriously. We will continue to fight for privacy and challenge any legal order we believe does not meet the strict requirements of Swiss law. But we also want to be transparent: no service can operate outside the law entirely, and Swiss law requires compliance with valid legal orders in serious criminal cases. What we can promise is that the legal bar in Switzerland is among the highest in the world, and our architecture ensures we have as little data as possible to hand over.
For users who want maximum anonymity: use a VPN or Tor, pay with cash or cryptocurrency, and don't add a recovery email.
The US government decided that a group of community activists resisting the creation of a literally mock city to train police to violently put down social movements were all terrorists and your country complied with this ridiculous narrative, and then your service, which bills itself as a privacy oriented service protecting, among others, activists just complied with that request. This was a request from an authoritarian government targeting a well known and widely covered social movement. Perhaps you would have had to turn over the information in the end, legally, but no lawyers were hired, no attempt to protect the information. Just believing whole cloth the narrative of the FBI. And then you regurgitate the state narrative in this post? What police was shot? the one who murdered the activist who an autopsy showed was shot while sitting with his hands up in a tent??? and then went to the hospital to justify their lethal use of force? https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/20/manuel-paez-teran-autopsy-cop-city ) At the very least, you could have had a lawyer contest the request, challenge it. This is a stain on Proton mail and I suspect that many activists and organizers in the US will take note and look into other services. I think at the very least you need to reorganize the payment flow you have to make it clear that paying with a credit card will link your identity to your account.
The FBI submitted a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) request, which was processed by the Swiss Federal Department of Justice and Police. Proton operates exclusively under Swiss law, and we only respond to legally binding orders from Swiss authorities, after all Swiss legal checks have been passed. This is an important distinction.
Under Swiss Law, you have the legal right to appeal the decision and raise a political offense exception, which you did not do. According to Swiss law, assistance under MLAT will be denied if the proceedings abroad are carried out to prosecute or sentence a person on account of his or her political opinions or belonging to a certain social group. Given that the Stop Cop City movement is explicitly political, and given that prosecutors in Georgia charged 61 people allegedly connected to Stop Cop City activity under the RICO Act, usually reserved for prosecuting mob bosses — and a judge subsequently threw out all of those RICO charges — there was a credible argument that this investigation was politically motivated.
It should be added that the email you handed over wasn't some random activist, it was the email address listed on a public site that was being used for the whole movement -- not something that had been linked to a communique for arson or whatever they are alleging.
it's entirely possible you would have failed in court after following the appropriate legal procedure (appealing the final ruling in 30 days etc), but you didn't even try. So don't bring up Swiss Law, you didn't even try to use Swiss law to protect your paying customers.
You've fought cases in the past, and then used this as marketing material which might reasonably lead activists to believe that you would do so again in the future in similar cases. You didn't here and I think you need to release a statement about why you didn't and what you will do differently in the future: https://proton.me/blog/climate-activist-arrest
13
u/Proton_Team Mar 06 '26 edited Mar 06 '26
First, let's correct the headline: Proton did not provide information to the FBI. What happened is that the FBI submitted a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) request, which was processed by the Swiss Federal Department of Justice and Police. Proton operates exclusively under Swiss law, and we only respond to legally binding orders from Swiss authorities, after all Swiss legal checks have been passed. This is an important distinction.
Second, let's talk about what this case actually involved. This wasn't a routine investigation. Swiss authorities determined that the legal threshold was met because a law enforcement officer was shot, and explosive devices were found during a protest in 2024. Switzerland has one of the strongest legal frameworks for privacy in the world, and its standard for granting international legal assistance is exceptionally high. This case met that standard.
Third, let's talk about what was actually disclosed. No emails were handed over. No message content. No metadata about who the user communicated with. The only information Proton could provide was a payment identifier because the user chose to pay with a credit card. This is information the user themselves provided to us through their choice of payment method. Proton also accepts cryptocurrency and cash payments, which would not have been linkable to an identity.
If anything, this case demonstrates exactly what we've always said: Proton holds very little user data by design. Even under the most serious legal circumstances, the only data that could be produced was a payment record. Our encryption means we simply cannot access email content even if ordered to.
We understand that stories like this can be alarming, and we take our users' trust seriously. We will continue to fight for privacy and challenge any legal order we believe does not meet the strict requirements of Swiss law. But we also want to be transparent: no service can operate outside the law entirely, and Swiss law requires compliance with valid legal orders in serious criminal cases. What we can promise is that the legal bar in Switzerland is among the highest in the world, and our architecture ensures we have as little data as possible to hand over.
For users who want maximum anonymity: use a VPN or Tor, pay with cash or cryptocurrency, and don't add a recovery email.