Currently, Proton’s kill switch documentation is incorrect, which seems fairly severe:
Now, we can certainly note this ourselves, and I have a PR open to do so:
Do we want to take stronger action against Proton for this?
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Maybe make a letter to Proton as the PG community and ask they rephrase themselves. Not sure how much weight we pull, but it may be worth a shot.
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The fact that a company with that much money at their disposal can’t fix the known issues with their VPN is disturbing. The fact that they purposefully advertise capabilities they know they don’t have is even more disturbing. I think we should delist them, and/or move them to a note at the bottom of the VPN page that explains they are the best free option for people who need a free VPN. If they decide to spend their money on fixing the bugs that have been known about for too long, they can get listed again.
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2 posts were merged into an existing topic: What should we require of VPN providers on macOS?
Personally I think its better process wise to err on enforcing criteria and removing tools that dont meet them.
Unlike the killswitch debate there really isn’t any extenuating circumstance to point too, that makes sense to keep Proton and warrant disregarding the criteria. Especially when we already have multiple other threads over the years pointing out lesser infractions such as Proton claiming tools were open source before they were.
We already have a process for changing the criteria and adding Proton or another tool back if need be.
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I agree, but in this case strictly speaking it’s no longer against our criteria, even if it’s still a problem we have with them. Unless we think it is against our marketing criteria at https://www.privacyguides.org/en/vpn/#marketing which I guess is exactly what I’m asking in this thread.
The interesting thing is that we give a specific list in our criteria of things we find to be “irresponsible,” which the issue in this thread doesn’t really fit into, so currently our criteria is vague as far as whether they should be delisted or not:
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To clarify my point then, to me its clearly making a false guarantee which i think is one of the things the marketing criteria supposed to be a guard rail against. Its hard for me to give them the benefit of the doubt as, like I said previously, they have been caught being deceptive before.
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What options would be available other than:
- The proposed note within the recommendation
- Delisting
Would it be a PSA (or call to action) similar to: A Flaw With the Security Level Slider in Tor Browser - Privacy Guides ?
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Given they have repearedly marketing themselves and making bold marketing materials that they are not actuallly living up to, I think their marketing team does need to know the community pushback.
Their products are mostly fine, but not their marketing.
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I think it would be better to get a reply from official Proton member. False marketing is also illegal. If Proton really wants to stay in PG as a recommended VPN, they should clarify the concerns and misconceptions.
We can wait here in PG forums for an official reply (which can take a long time), or someone from PG team can reach out to Proton directly (likely faster way).
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Or mention @Proton_Team.
I would highly suggest customers of Proton report this.
Put some effort into the report, as in steps-to-reproduce so they know its a widespread issue.
If you can provide screenshots/logs where possible.
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It seems like Proton has long left the core privacy fans and privacy community members behind in terms of listening to them and making their products better. We made them in the earlier days, and they used to also brag about listening to the community first. But it no longer feels that way. Progress is slow which I can live with but not listening to the community anymore is what irks me. Also their marketing is closer to how big tech does it than what it used to be when they were more honest and upfront in good faith.
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Their account was active five days ago:
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Yes, I am aware. They had to be called upon by someone else who works for Proton to comment here. They don’t listen/participate here otherwise.. not anymore.
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What PG does not get are the more public views that of Reddit. PG should make an official account on/for Reddit and only use it to highlight the growing concerns and consensus on issues related to any privacy product - whether it be a Proton VPN or any other tool to bring it to the company’s/developers attention.
Thought I’d share this idea.
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I plan to do so over this weekend. I have more to say than jsut the VPN.
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I would report this through customer service channels and not to that account on these forums, as that will get entered into their zendesk system.
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Since the PG stance is that something not being recommended doesn’t mean that PG recommends against it, why not give Proton a break from the community too, and let them return once they fix their issues?
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