The encrypted email service has more features than ever and surpassed 100 million users worldwide:
Encrypted email company Proton has announced one of the biggest new additions to its growing suite of privacy-focused apps: Proton Pass, an end-to-end encrypted password manager.
[...] To get a better perspective on Proton's recent changes and its ambitions for the future, Gizmodo sat down with Proton's CEO, Andy Yen, to discuss what the company's been up to and where it's headed in the future. Proton Pass is the most consequential new feature that Proton has released in quite some time. Currently available only as a limited beta, Pass can only be accessed by Lifetime and Visionary Proton users, and even then on an invite-only basis. That said, the company says that a general launch of the app will happen "later this year," meaning it should soon be available to all users.
"A password manager has been one of the most common requests from the Proton community ever since we first launched Proton Mail," Yen wrote in a company blog post. "Proton Pass is not just another password manager. It's perhaps the first one built by a dedicated encryption and privacy company, leading to tangible differences in security."
[...] Speaking with Gizmodo, Proton's Yen said that the growth of consumer interest in privacy services over the past several years has generated more competition in his industry but it has also helped drive business to Proton.
"Back when we started, end-to-end encryption, abbreviated E2EE, was something that spies or crazy people were using—it was barely something most people had heard about," Yen tells me. That changed in the intervening years—as an ever-compounding slew of privacy scandals drew attention to the dangers of surveillance capitalism and government spying. Today, the average consumer is much more well versed in services like E2EE, said Yen.
The demand for privacy is so high today that tech companies who were once major data retailers have rebranded themselves as privacy guardians. Meta, which was infamously embroiled in the Cambridge Analytica scandal and has been tied to other disturbing data-mining episodes, has since promised features like E2E encrypted messaging—in a bid to make itself seem more privacy-friendly to users. Apple, meanwhile, has made privacy one of the core tenets of its brand—famously rolling out a new tagline: "Privacy. That's Apple," despite glaring violations that speak to the contrary.
For Yen, these efforts don't cut a lot of ice. "Big Tech is not going to be incentivized—from a business model perspective—to deliver the level of privacy that users really expect," he said. "No matter what Zuck says, nothing can change the fundamental fact that he makes money by selling your data."
(Score: 3, Troll) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Sunday April 23, @09:39AM (3 children)
I love your secure encrypted mail service that keep all my mail private and secure. So the one feature I really need is a 3rd party cliosed-source program I can surrender my password to.
Can you help me?
Yours truly,
-- A user who wants security but can't be assed to learn his passwords
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 23, @11:44PM
Yes. Yes we can.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Monday April 24, @05:57AM
In that case, check out pass [die.net].
It's simple, open source and uses tried and tested (GPG2) strong encryption to store passwords.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 24, @08:25PM
https://proton.me/blog/proton-pass-security-model [proton.me]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 25, @04:57AM
Though they may be better than most, there is no real privacy in networked communications. Content may be hard to reach, but routing is trivial to see