I’ve seen it shared a few times, and this is pretty concerning..
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I’m not the best person to respond to all these claims, but I don’t know why there would be an expectation they don’t use US servers for something like this. It wouldn’t work reliably if everyone had to send their video feed to switzerland and back. And yes, they must comply with government orders.
Any accessing of a web service through one’s computer travels through nodes operated by various people. These are subject to the laws of the country they are in (and leaving US could make it less private, as US is allowed to spy more on foreignly located data). The content can be kept private through encryption, but various information could be collected like times or IPs.
I think it’s safe to say you shouldn’t be using Proton Meet if you need your communications to be kept completely private from the US government, not only the content but all information related the communication like times and location, and you expect to be targeted by police or even an NSA level threat. That isn’t “concerning” so much as the tool isn’t for you. It could be a good alternative to zoom for meetings that you want to be kept reasonably private, like a corporation afraid of their plans being leaked to a rival company.
Signal can do voice and video calls, so I would stick with that if you want to maximize privacy. With that goal, you should also leave certain types of communication to only happen in person. This is already the procedure of radical activist groups who expect to be targeted by the FBI. Often they use pseudonyms and will avoid answering certain types of questions even from trusted people.
If this is your situation, you should get more information from more experienced members of your community, which I bet isn’t going to use proton meet. If you just want your communications to be reasonably private for zoom style communication then I wouldn’t worry about the latest proton hit piece, though you can stick with signal if that works for you.
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I’m kind of in the same boat. I think I need more context on this this from people more experienced with it. And one of the reasons for that, is I had to stop reading a lot of Sams stuff, because in his analysis about Proton services, he does do a lot of bad faith, half truth, nuance lacking doombaiting. But when it comes to proton meet, I’m not experienced enough to know about all these intricacies.
I do think Proton marketing may be overstating the benefits, but hype is their job as the marketing department.
The aggressive marketing is the only aspect I dislike about proton, which makes them feel more corporate. However the alternatives aren’t nonprofits, don’t have generous free services, nor are they as technically developed.
I’ve come to forgive a certain amount of marketing from Proton, but I can see value in challenging misleading claims. Ideally this gets paired with an explanation of for whom the claims are relevant, rather than used as fear mongering.
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