Why repost this with the sensationalist headline but not include the context provided in the comments by @artyom@piefed.social
"The author omitted the complete statement from Reddit:
Hi everyone,
No, Proton did not knowingly block journalists’ email accounts. Our support for journalists and those working in the public interest has been demonstrated time and again through actions, not just words.
In this case, we were alerted by a CERT that certain accounts were being misused by hackers in violation of Proton’s Terms of Service. This led to a cluster of accounts being disabled.
Because of our zero-access architecture, we cannot see the content of accounts and therefore cannot always know when anti-abuse measures may inadvertently affect legitimate activism.
Our team has reviewed these cases individually to determine if any can be restored. We have now reinstated 2 accounts, but there are other accounts we cannot reinstate due to clear ToS violations.
Regarding Phrack’s claim on contacting our legal team 8 times: this is not true. We have only received two emails to our legal team inbox, last one on Sep 6 with a 48-hour deadline. This is unrealistic for a company the size of Proton, especially since the message was sent to our legal team inbox on a Saturday, rather than through the proper customer support channels.
The situation has unfortunately been blown out of proportion without giving us a fair chance to respond to the initial outreach."
if a CERT came to whatever email provider you use and accused you of being a malicious hacker, your email service would absolutely terminate your account.
Ok, they are getting down votes, but technically true?Yes they reinstated it, but they assume guilt rather than check first?
I assume that they have a level of trust in the reporter, that hopefully they will not extend next time. I guess they must get a lot of these, and that failing to block spammers means they may lose trust of other email servers?
We have only received two emails to our legal team inbox, last one on Sep 6 with a 48-hour deadline. This is unrealistic for a company the size of Proton, especially since the message was sent to our legal team inbox on a Saturday, rather than through the proper customer support channels.
Semi-unrelated, but back when I worked weekends in phone support, nothing came close to the satisfaction of delivering a “no, we can’t do that right now” or “sorry, but that’s not even our issue” to some cranky bastard on a Saturday morning. Then, after listening to a fully grown adult have a tantrum, promising that a superior would reach out during business hours… Monday. I knew full well they would spend 2 full days stewing, only to hear back from someone in management who would say something like “the agent you spoke to was absolutely correct, we don’t have any control over the quality of your Internet connection, we are not your ISP, go talk to them, goodbye.” I was lucky to have some pretty based individuals I would report to - sometimes they’d even let me listen in on those escalation calls live to enjoy the resulting unhinged meltdowns. Talk about catharsis.
Why repost this with the sensationalist headline but not include the context provided in the comments by @artyom@piefed.social
"The author omitted the complete statement from Reddit:
So, in summary, Proton will block any account, without any evidence, just because a random CERT says so.
if a CERT came to whatever email provider you use and accused you of being a malicious hacker, your email service would absolutely terminate your account.
Ok, they are getting down votes, but technically true?Yes they reinstated it, but they assume guilt rather than check first?
I assume that they have a level of trust in the reporter, that hopefully they will not extend next time. I guess they must get a lot of these, and that failing to block spammers means they may lose trust of other email servers?
Proton’s reply says they also were flagged by their abuse system
Semi-unrelated, but back when I worked weekends in phone support, nothing came close to the satisfaction of delivering a “no, we can’t do that right now” or “sorry, but that’s not even our issue” to some cranky bastard on a Saturday morning. Then, after listening to a fully grown adult have a tantrum, promising that a superior would reach out during business hours… Monday. I knew full well they would spend 2 full days stewing, only to hear back from someone in management who would say something like “the agent you spoke to was absolutely correct, we don’t have any control over the quality of your Internet connection, we are not your ISP, go talk to them, goodbye.” I was lucky to have some pretty based individuals I would report to - sometimes they’d even let me listen in on those escalation calls live to enjoy the resulting unhinged meltdowns. Talk about catharsis.