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@arise1984

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In my opinion, they use vague terms like “abusive registrations” and “bulk signups” so that they have the excuse to ban/issue warning to whoever feels suspicious to them, while also continuing serve other customers that do the same thing but somehow don’t trigger their anti-abuse algorithm. So as long as you don’t trigger the anti-abuse system, you will be fine. Many people said they had multiple aliases for the same website and didn’t receive any warning.

Exactly my thinking.

Proton ToS ≠ Addy ToS

There might be some truth to this, but it’s still a problem. ToS should be clear. Even if you are correct, Proton and Addy do NOT interpret the word “bulk” the same way.

@arise1984

On another note of proton questionable policy, they did spelled it out in their tos that multiple proton free accounts are prohibited, ie 2 is literal multiple so technically only 1 are permitted. But their staff, wearing “proton staff” reddit tag said that its fine to have multiple free accounts as long as they’re not use abusively.

Exactly. For Proton, it’s anything more than one, which is completely contrary to what “bulk” actually means.

Also, in a past comment about this, I pointed ou that Proton makes that rule very clear when they give you a warning.

You have tried to register multiple times to ******** and this is against the terms of service of SimpleLogin. Please don’t do that anymore.

If you continue registering multiple accounts to a single service we will have to disable your account.

Multiple means anything more than one.

In their FAQ Addy says:

No, you must not use addy.io to create large numbers of accounts on other websites/services as this is against the terms and conditions

They use the term “large”, which like “bulk” emphasizes a great order of magnitude. It suggests that having 2 or 3 aliases for the same website would be ok. And to get confirmation, I asked the owner of Addy, and he said it would be perfectly fine for me to have 3 to 4 aliases for any website. It’s only after I got his confirmation, that I signed up for a premium subscription.

That is very different from Proton who say in their warnings, and in my interactions with their support team, that only one alias per third party website is allowed.

Always ask for confirmation

I strongly recommend anyone who wants to ask Proton a question for which the answer is not clear to demand that they triple check their information. Do not be satisfied with a simple answer, especially if it’s the answer that you want. And when they make a statement, repeat it to them in your own words, and ask them to confirm your understanding is correct.

If they say you are only allowed one alias per third party website, ask them to confirm that statement like this:

So what you’re saying is, if I have 2 Instagram accounts, I can use a Proton Pass alias for only one of them?

I argued back and forth with Proton to get a clear answer on aliases. And many times since, I’ve had interactions with Proton on social media where I had to correct them because they gave the wrong information. All this is to say, there are many Proton support agents who do not know that the alias limit is one per third party website, and will tell you otherwise, unless you ask them to double check and get confirmation from colleagues or superiors.