We’re living through an unprecedented situation with the pandemic. At Proton, we always strive to step up and help our community. That’s why we are introducing a series of measures to help with the global response to #COVID-19.
A free, permanent storage increase of up to 10 GB. All existing paid users and all new paid subscriptions started before April 30 will be eligible for this increase. You shouldn’t have to worry about running out of space right now.
We’re offering free email and VPN services for a year to organizations who are helping with the coronavirus crisis. If you feel you qualify, reach out to us here: enterprise+covid@protonmail.com.
We’re increasing ProtonVPN capacity by adding dozens of new paid, free, and Secure Core servers to make sure you get reliable service during the global surge of Internet usage.
We are also contributing, in the best way we can, toward a COVID-19 cure by donating computing power in our Zurich datacenter to the Rosetta@home project.
Switzerland prides itself on independence, yet 68% of listed firms run on US email (the gateway to the whole tech stack). 🇨🇭
Independence is hard if your infrastructure is controlled abroad.
Let’s talk about it 👇
1/5
Why it matters
🚩 Foreign laws reach Swiss data (CLOUD Act)
🚩 Geopolitical leverage over critical sectors
🚩 Less control over data storage and processing
🚩 Swiss data can be used to train AI
🚩 Limits Swiss innovation
For a nation built on independence and neutrality, this is a massive vulnerability.
2/5
Which Swiss sectors rely most on US tech?
Out of the 68% Swiss businesses that rely on US email services, several sensitive sectors are even more dependent:
🧰 Utilities 80%
🏥 Health care 77%
💊 Pharma & biotech 77%
💻 Software and IT services 75%
⚡️ Energy 67%
Ever had someone give you something and not want to give it back? Data brokers feel the same…
An investigation by The Markup found that 35 registered Californian data brokers have noindex code on opt-out & data deletion pages.
Why? To keep them off search engines.
1/6
That's not the only way that brokers create obstacles to user privacy.
An analysis of 750 US-based data broker groups revealed that 100s of brokers registered in one state but failed to register in another, despite the legal requirement.
Most of them operate nationally...
2/6
Another study found that 43% of data brokers fail to respond to requests; the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) requires them to do so within 45 days.
Even when responding, many impose extra hurdles, such as requiring people to share even more personal data.
3/6