The CEO of PROTON answers YOUR questions! Drive, Linux support, Photos, features, and a lot more!

47 thoughts on “The CEO of PROTON answers YOUR questions! Drive, Linux support, Photos, features, and a lot more!”

• Would be good to see login alias restrictions & the option to opt out of account recovery via support.

  Don't really like the current way support is handled by most services, in saying that would be nice if I could use 3 keys and the card number on my account to verify with support, for example proof I own a PGP key, a U2F verifier and last digits of card number or a recovery key.

  If I needed 2 of those as proof as an option I'd be happy, though again probably wouldn't work for most people.

  Don't want the process automated though, can see that being abused.

  As for IMAP / bridge, anyone got a solution for storing email locally and viewing via terminal, would like links to just be plan text with the images ignored while also keeping the emails encrypted unless I am reading it, like syncing then auto encrypting the local file in the directory that I have to manually decrypt once I'm ready to read them?
  Don't want it auto decrypting once I enter user password for general use though would like it it encrypted immediately after downloading the emails to the device? Makes no sense to me to keep them unencrypted or bind the keys to user accounts as all it takes is the account to be reset by the network administrator in order to accessmy emails which I'd rather not be the case incase it's compromised or my laptop gets stolen and I've not locked it.

  Mean that example was relating to two different things and doesn't tie the best, though think it expresses what I'd like to achieve, struggling to find the information I want online regarding self hosting or syncing, best option I found was a plugin for thunderbird though isn't really how I want it implemented and I'd rather use terminal for email via my leased domains since they rarely need access to images and have pretty good idea on how to go about attachments / spam.

  Definitely could use a push in right direction rather than products I have no control over, mean can't do much about plan text over the network though would at least like control over storage as I'm sick of losing data and the other issues associated.

• I have paid account for years. Here's what I would love to see, the ability to expand any email to full screen, either for reading or when composing new emails not yet sent.

• Great video, I really enjoy the explainations and honesty. I am glad to be a proton customer and can't wait for the new features to come out. Continue your good work!

• Good interview and I like Proton generally but really frustrating to hear him say that having multiple accounts is an acceptable way to aid your privacy. I tried to do literally this earlier this year and got warning notices on all of the others saying I was in breach of T&Cs. The T&Cs are super vague on this point and it needs clearing up internally and on the website if it's something the CEO is going to suggest.

• Hey Nick, great video as always appreciate you gave Andy the room to speak as I know it can be tempting to be active when discussing a topic you're knowledgeable and passionate about, but I always prefer when the interviewees are really given that space to speak.

  Andy seemed like a very knowledgeable and genuine guy with his finger on the communities pulse. Fair play to him for doing the interview.

  My biggest concern with proton is they will become a victim of their own sucess and if they create an ecosystem that truly rivals that of the big tech giants will be at risk of a change of leadership or a life changing acquisition offer turning them into what they're trying to destroy.

  For features my personal list is:
  All apps on F-Droid, a separate notes app with a robust import feature (just clone Google keep, I just can't ditch it atm) and small, but please roll out material themed icons on android. Proton apps stick out like a sore thumb atm!

• I signed up for Proton Unlimited for their Cyber Monday sale. Was starting to move all my email from Gmail over. I had a forwarding address (not Gmail) I have been paying on for almost 15 years and didn't want to lose it, but it's not a domain I own. That was a problem for Proton mail, so I had to get a refund. Between that problem and the awfully slow to update mobile app, I had to bounce. I would have put up with the slow app, but not being able to use my forwarding address was a showstopper.

• #StopVivekBindra

• So anything for Linux is years away.

• As a current, paying Proton Mail & VPN user, I would LOVE to have a streamlined all in one app on my Steam Deck(Arch Linux). Something that's easy to navigate with a controller, and focuses on features relevant to mobile gaming/computing. VPN, browser, cloud storage, etc.

• Great interview! This confirmed me that Proton is one of the best suites of software out there.

• I do like the idea of an office suite, but I think the first logical step with Proton’s family of products would be a web browser. If they made something like Brave without all the flipping crypto advertisements, that would be the perfect suite of products. An Office-alternative would be nice but not really necessary with LibreOffice being out there.

• 1:13:30 – Quantum Computing

  There is a Quantum Net in developement paralell to the InterNet,
  Maybe you sould explore new email protocols for that net, since a transition is inevitable.

• Hey Nick, really great interview! Thank you and thanks to Andy Yen too of course 🙂

• what's the best deal to get all of proton services (all in one with easy switching between services) (if any)?

• When Andy gained my trust when said that it's a matter of time when Proton will get hacked, not a matter of if.

• I enjoyed the interview: the clarity that Andy has on every topic, the honesty in his answers. That's really likeable

• I really miss one feature in the proton VPN app for all platforms android windows Linux which is the ability to chose the country I want to connect to 😢 I hope let us pick the the server we want to connect to it in the country we want to connect to.

• What a great interview, Andy is very down to earth and pragmatic. Have been a happy subscriber of Proton for some time, and am in it for the long haul now.

• I have my doubts about Switzerland. Think about how they folded over taxation regimes with their banking and insurance. They will bend over for the US whenever asked.

• Shout out to Nick for being a gracious and interesting host. Love your channel.

• I really would like Proton Apps for Mail, Calendar, and Contacts for MacOS and Linux. I am all for it – do it.

• I like Proton Mail. They offer reslly strong alternatives to Google software, and I like their support for FOSS and Linux.

• Let me echo many comments. Mr. Yen is a very pleasant and strategic thinking CEO and leader. Loved listening to him talk about Proton. As a customer – I am increasing the level of my paid subscription. So far – after two years using Proton – it has been flawless. Just got an email today that the Proton Mail app is our in beta for Mac OS and Windows and will be out for Linux early next year. Their product and services is constantly being improved. If they do an office suite – yikes – that will shake up the market.

• Still lacking is the contacts implementation on Android, it's promised in the docs, but still not there and without it the whole contacts feature is kinda useless I can't actually use the contacts in there unless I want to manually lookup Infos…

• Nick, you are amazing.
  Proton sounds promising.
  Should have joined the question list 🙁 I'll be more alert next time.
  Quesions:

  1. I understand the need to create a trusted VPN service, still would you consider splitting Proton.VPN to a new companey with a new name?
  I ask, because currently you might update the VPNService at the expense of the EMail Service – Split Loyelty between EMail focused users and VPN focused users.

  2. How do you feel about team-play between companies?
  I imagine no company can stand alone, delivery companies, hw manufacuterers and support for the hw any company is using …
  So, I just feel the sceme of other companies tied with Proton is segnificant and worth talking about.
  How do you handle a state with no good partners? or parteners alligned to your service ideals, You can't always build the company you want to use.

  3. When a new company brings to market new tech, do you feel the authorities responsible for gaurding the community's wellfare should be responsible for fast adaptation of that tech? or is it the responsibility of the new company to standarties and assist the authorities that inforce the standards?

• I've been a customer for years and have used their products a lot, most recently ProtonPass (which was a lot better than the cumbersome solution I used before that). Nothing but praise, even as a Linux user!

• This stinks of Three Letter Agencies all over. Why he mentions so much Russia or Iran? Funny that they have the same enemy.
  It´s another tool to promote the "color revolutions"

• big fan of their proton mail app and their VPN too is pretty good!

• What?? No question about their betrayal of VPN customers?! And an obvious one, about the Hushmail fiasco (police forced them to create malware for a specific client)!

• I love listening to Andy and his take, I've always found him transparent, he isn't your usual gung-ho CEO. Sadly I've found some of the products such as Proton Drive not as reliable as others, so I'd rather they spent resources on reliability and having similar experiences across apps/platforms

• I pay for proton and enjoy its benefits. I do wish that Proton would integrate only office or nextcloud in their services so that I can operate in the Proton services like I do at work with MS 365.

• Dang the funnest questions weren't asked xd

  Like thoughts on
  Collaborating with nextcloud and thunderbird 😀
  Especially considering thunderbird is available on windows mac and linux :p

• Good video

• If you use Proton Mail with email clients, such as Thunderbird, Outlook, be ready that not all your emails will be loaded in the client. I am in touch for long time with Proton support and finally they accepted that this problem exists. Now they are working to fix this problem. Soon hopefully will be released the Proton Mail Desktop Client, I am for waiting it.
  Proton notes is very good Idea. Now I am using Evernote and would be very happy to have something similar, but more secure. Evernote does not have good tools for saving code snippets in they notes, please do it in a better way then Evernote.

• That was very informative, I honestly wasn't entirely sure what Proton was about completely, but now I feel I understand it much better.

• Eric Murphy has an excellent video about trusting Proton Mail to dispute the claims that they are a honey pot.

  My biggest issue is that they dont say there are inherent flaws with e-mail for privacy and security, but they make it sound like it is the most secure and private communication on their site and general advertisement (I know the CEO acknowledge there are issues in this interview).
  If Proton Mail offered integration with Signal messaging or something they could make clear distinction between best secure/private e-mail and actual private/secure messaging. It might also help Proton minimise data from their users being handed out by court order since those users shouldn’t really be using any e-mail but something like Signal.
  Then internal e-mail (perhaps also with other e-mail providers supporting the end to end e-mail encryption) does offer very good privacy/security but that ain’t going to be most e-mails since not everyone is using Proton (or other encrypted e-mail providers), but it will be good for businesses/organisations where they use e-mail as internal communication and they all could be using the same e-mail provider, such as Proton.

  I could also see more businesses/organisations wanting to use Proton if they offered Office suite so you dont need Google or Microsoft for that as well as e-mail and cloud storage.

• Ads work like this, they see your cookies and browsing history and then show you relavant ads, Proton is the lesser evil not the messiah of mail.

• Tried the free proton vpn, couldn't connect with whatever server. That's my experience

• Awesome interview! This made me think about paying the the subscription of Proton services, really nice company and with a nice CEO.

• also when will there be a stable proton drive api for something like rclone

• caldav proton bridge is so important

• Proton pass has notes but Proton mail should have a link to those notes in the web app instead of only being accessible in the browser extension

• To me as a Proton user on Linux for a few years now, the big things I've been hoping for from Proton are desktop apps that work. There has been no email client. The bridge may as well be broken to me as I was never able to get it to work. And finally the VPN app broke with a Python update years ago. I would hope it was fixed at some point, but it stopped working for enough months that I gave up. If there's a new VPN app now, I'd better go take a look at it.
  I hope that they are able to make Flatpak work for them and at least remove the fragmentation problem.

• Web apps are the best why make platform specific apps just do it all through webapps

• They should pair up with Session

• The backend is still not open source. Thanks Mr Yen, but I will stick to my self-hosted Debian email server.

• so where is proton pics? Is this part of the new desktop applications?

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