this post was submitted on 30 Oct 2026
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Andy Yen's values are incompatible with Proton's mission. He advocates for poor security practices, supports fascists, and he verbally abuses his subordinates. As such, I can no longer in good conscience continue to financially support a company with such terrible leadership.

Unfortunately for me, my subscription just renewed last month on a multi year plan, but it does give me time to browse for and experiment with alternatives.

If you're able, I encourage you to do the same and cite Andy Yen as the driving factor for your decision. We can't let these tech bro fascists destroy what little semblance of privacy we have left.

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[–] IndustryStandard@lemmy.world -3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (4 children)

Mullvad supporting literal Neo Nazis crosses a line for me but Proton using some LLMs is not that level of massive ethical breach. But feel free to support other smaller VPNs. Only good for alternatives. Proton will probably sell out harder at some point.

[–] AHemlocksLie@lemmy.zip 11 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Even if you're morally okay with Proton, the simple fact is that vibe coding the piss out of their product is going to seriously endanger the privacy and security that make Proton an appealing product.

[–] PenisLipsYinYang69@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I just switched over to Windscribe, I get unlimited data, servers in US and Canada all for 3 bucks a month.

[–] roofuskit@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

Servers in US and Canada is an issue for a lot of people.

[–] roofuskit@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

Proton sponsored far right YouTubers.

[–] oce@jlai.lu 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Is this a reference to this?

We would like to address the recent controversy about one of the owners of Mullvad making a donation to a Swedish political party.

It was a private donation from Daniel the individual. Mullvad or its parent and sister companies did not endorse and were not involved in it. https://mullvad.net/en/blog/donation-controversy

[–] IndustryStandard@lemmy.world 0 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Yes but Mullvad did not denounce it

[–] oce@jlai.lu 0 points 23 hours ago

They did say they do not support it, it's a private initiative. It still bad in the sense that giving money to Mullvad makes this guy richer, but it's not as bad as the company head as a whole supporting this party.