Proton alternative recommendations

Privacy Questions
1

Hi all

I am currently a Proton Family subscriber and I am thinking about moving to other solutions but I don’t know how to proceed.

My environment is pure Windows desktops and iOS devices. I don’t have any Android and Macs.

My needs are below;

  1. A service similar or better to SimpleLogin
  2. A mail service for 3 users with alias support, at least 10 or more for each user. Desktop app is a must, I hate browser based mails.
  3. A VPN service with IPv6 support and DoH support. I want to use my NextDNS / Control D with my VPN
  4. Proper Password Manager. I have 1Password Family but lately I am having too many issues with it. For example, can’t add secondary account from family to the Windows app unless I log out my main user. Autofill is not recognizing many fields, and iOS app is having too many issues lately.
  5. A cloud storage with lots of space.

Only good thing about Proton is the price at the moment. I checked mailbox.org and they cost more than Proton for 3 users. Same for Tuta. Proton Pass is okayish, but it is nowhere closer to Bitwarden or 1Password level. Even Keepass has more functionality than Proton Pass. Proton Drive is bad. Yes, it is secure but it doesn’t have basic things, like when you reinstall it, you have another Computer entry in the vault. Why? You can’t install it to the same folder if you installed it before, sync always fails, unless you tinker with registry.

I think only Proton Mail is good in Proton products but most basic thing like custom domain sharing requires Family subscription. Otherwise I would have downgraded my account long time ago.

I am thinking about going back to Microsoft 365 Business subs, but they will also cost higher than Proton.

What can you recommend? I really wanted to Proton to work, but very slow development phase and no clear roadmap are killing everything.

2

Proton Drive actually has an rclone storage system (but it is in beta and unofficial) but last I checked it could not login.
But at the end of the day, you get what you pay for.

3

As I was reading your post the M365 you mentioned was the first thing to come to mind.

Does an iCloud family membership give you the features you are looking for?

1 Like
4

I surmise that iCloud is not a viable option if one predominantly uses Windows for desktop computing. The iCloud application for Windows is notoriously subpar, particularly when utilizing ADP. An alternative is to access iCloud through a web browser, though this is also less than ideal.

Moreover, if a single service does not meet all your specified needs, such as Proton, it is probable that you will incur higher costs by subscribing to multiple different services.

1 Like
5

Many of the requirements were related to mail so I’m not sure being on Windows matters, but quite a few functions appear to be available, including the iCloud password manager. See link below.

ADP also appears to be available on Windows, which I was surprised to find out.

Worth considering, since OP uses iOS and likely has an iCloud account already.

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6

Yes, I have Apple One Premier subscription but I am not sure about moving everything to iCloud. It is very hard to manage, and as for my Apple devices I have only iPhone and iPad, don’t have Mac.

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7

I didn’t subscribe to proton because I didn’t want to put all my eggs in on basket so I diversified. This is what I choose as privacy tool :

  • Email => Tuta, because they offer 15 aliases and you can use the desktop app
  • VPN => Mullvad
  • Cloud => Filen, you can add until 10GB
  • PasswordManager => NorthPass, autofill works perfectly on Android and Linux, don’t know about the family plan
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8

Why would you use Nordpass instead of something more secure and reliable like Bitwarden ?

8 Likes
9

I won’t use Nord products even if they pay me to use them.

7 Likes
10

The thing is, I am paying too much money for everything, and now I trying to cut the costs while trying to make my environment more private and secure.

I have Google One with 2 TB, because iCloud Photos are very hard to maintain outside i-Devices. I can’t even access my videos and photos if I enable so called Advanced Data Protection because it is not recognizing Windows browsers. Same goes for Apple Music. I am paying Apple One Premier because I needed Apple Music which I can use with Cider only, and 2 TB space for my media files.

I have 1Password, which is getting buggier every day. I couldn’t even add my kid’s account because reasons… 1Password support told me to create a separate Windows account for the kid. Yeah. Instead of able to add a secondary account like a normal person, I have to create a second Windows account for my kid, who only plays Peppa Pig on my computer for 10 mins, and I am managing her passwords, but yeah, can’t do that with 1Password.

Proton Pass, can’t even sort my logins alphabetically and remember the setting. I am not even mentioning lack of multi select abilities, lack of custom fields, even basic ID form or credit card fills.

Proton Drive, can’t even match Google Drive and OneDrive. Today it received an update so that it can backup photos, but it is only backup. Nothing like Google Photos or Ente. It can’t even delete the photos once they are backed up. Upload is slow as hell, maybe Proton is using dial-up connection on their data servers, I don’t know. Some of you can say that encryption can take time, but considering I have iPhone 15 Pro Max, it shouldn’t take this long, right? It has been hours (I think around 3 hours) and it only managed to backup 1000+ photos. I can’t give the exact number because this app can’t show the status like Google Photos.

My cloud storage is around 800ish GB, and my family photos and videos are taking around 450-500ish GB. It is imperative that the cloud storage provider shouldn’t have any file limits because I am backing up my virtual servers too, which are very large in size.

I checked Fastmail because I thought they were privacy friendly, but after reading their privacy policy I wonder how they have the nerve to say that they are privacy friendly.

11

Have you considered Mailbox? Instead of Fasmail?

12

Yeah, it will cost 21 Euro for me (9 Euro x2 for me and wifey and 3 Euro for kiddo), and that is only for email service

13

Why do you want to switch from Proton?

1 Like
14

I really wanted to everything in one place with the brand that I trust, but Proton lacks many things.

  • Proton Drive. Can’t sync items properly. Let’s say you reinstall your Proton Drive app, it creates another computer on the drive, why? I just want to sync my files securely without hassle, like Onedrive.
  • Proton Drive - Photos. Totally useless. I know that it just made public today, but you can’t delete photos, you can’t sort them, you can’t search them, and upload is so slow that I remembered my old US Robotics modem. It is a backup app made by 5 year old kids.
  • Proton Pass. Can’t sort logins, can’t autofill credit cards, can’t import everything from other password managers (like my software licenses, usernames / emails with two fields, no custom categories, no file imports, etc). I can’t unlock it with biometrics either. Yes, it is planned function but no one knows when it will happen. Search is totally broken compared to 1Pass.
  • Proton Mail. If it has custom domain sharing with family members, it would be perfect but nope. I have to buy family subscription for no reason. Not much important after making everything in order but daily filter execution limit makes no sense. I have a lot of custom rules on my business Outlook and never encountered such nonsense. Search is also slow even with indexing everything. Mail export is taking hours (more than 15-16 hours for 12 GB mailbox for me) and it is very hard to find who is the owner of the emails.
  • Proton VPN. No IPv6 support (it is planned for years but yeah), no 3rd party DoH/DoT support, no server grouping, no server sort by latency, no stealth protocol.
3 Likes
15

Is this true for the Windows icloud app as well?

16

Yes, as well as Apple Music for Windows. You need to disable Advanced Data Protection if you want to login.

17

@Bhaelros why is that?

18

With that scam and lie record, why would anyone use Nord products?

19

Never heard of in fact. Will you give me link where I can read about these lies and scams? Or will you enlighten me here?

20

FWIW, the apple documentations lists Windows iCloud app as compatible with ADP. Maybe updating will help?

Good luck in your search!

1 Like