A tech company you can actually like!
Summary
TLDRThis video discusses Proton, a tech company offering end-to-end encrypted email and a suite of privacy-focused productivity tools. Founded by CERN scientists post-Snowden, Proton has grown to over 100 million users, offering services like VPN, calendar, drive, and password manager. It stands out for its sustainable business model, user-friendly design, and commitment to privacy, differentiating it from competitors like Google and Mozilla.
Takeaways
- 📢 Tech companies are facing scrutiny for prioritizing revenue over user privacy, with Google recently being ruled against by a federal judge.
- 🗣️ The script discusses the need for tech companies to apologize to users, implying a lack of ethical practices in the industry.
- 🔒 Post-Snowden, there's been a surge in demand for encrypted internet services, highlighting the insecurity of traditional email.
- 💼 ProtonMail was founded by CERN scientists to provide an email service with end-to-end encryption, enhancing privacy.
- 🔑 ProtonMail uses PGP encryption by default, making it easy for users without requiring manual key management.
- 🌐 Proton has expanded beyond email to offer a suite of privacy-focused services, including VPN, calendar, drive, password manager, and more.
- 📈 The company has seen significant growth, with over 100 million sign-ups across services and a rapid release of new features.
- 💼 Proton's business model relies on subscription fees for premium features, allowing it to remain independent and financially sustainable.
- 🌟 A key differentiator for Proton is its commitment to building a complete ecosystem that can potentially replace mainstream services like Google Apps.
- 🔍 The script points out areas where Proton could improve, such as its ownership structure and compliance with legal warrants, affecting user trust.
Q & A
What was the catalyst for the demand for more encrypted internet services?
-The demand for more encrypted internet services surged after Edward Snowden's revelations in 2013 about government spying on people.
What was the inherent issue with email security before reforms?
-Email, developed in the 70s and 80s, was notoriously insecure with no real privacy built in by default, and encryption techniques like PGP were not universally adopted due to their complexity.
Why was it challenging to implement encryption across all email services?
-Implementing encryption across all email services was challenging because it required agreement and correct implementation of a new standard by millions of different mail servers operated by different companies.
How does ProtonMail address the issue of email encryption?
-ProtonMail offers real end-to-end encryption using PGP, automatically turning it on by default between all ProtonMail users, ensuring that even ProtonMail itself cannot read the emails.
What is the limitation of ProtonMail's encryption when interacting with non-ProtonMail users?
-The limitation is that if the other party uses any other email provider, ProtonMail cannot enforce privacy, as it has no control over how other email providers handle encryption.
What other services did ProtonMail expand to after its initial email service?
-ProtonMail expanded to Proton VPN, Proton Calendar, Proton Drive, acquired Simple Login, launched Proton Pass, and later added Proton Docs and Proton Wallet to its ecosystem.
How does ProtonMail's business model differ from other privacy-focused tech companies?
-ProtonMail's business model primarily relies on subscription fees for premium features, which is sustainable and allows the company to remain independent without external investments.
What is the significance of Proton's claim of having over 100 million sign-ups across its services?
-The claim signifies that ProtonMail has achieved significant scale, which is important for investing in an ecosystem of apps and for network effects, suggesting it is not an insignificant player in the market.
What are some of the concerns raised about ProtonMail's compliance with legal warrants?
-Some concerns include ProtonMail's compliance with Swiss legal warrants, which led to cases like the exposure of a French activist's IP address, raising debates about how much a privacy-focused company should comply with legal requests.
What is the role of the newly established Proton Foundation in ensuring the company's adherence to its mission?
-The Proton Foundation is intended to ensure permanent adherence to Proton's mission. However, the exact details of the foundation's ownership and powers are not entirely clear, which some argue could be made more transparent.
How does the Proton ecosystem aim to compete with major players like Google's suite of apps?
-The Proton ecosystem aims to compete by offering a complete set of privacy-focused productivity tools that are user-friendly and can theoretically replace services like Google's apps, with features like real-time collaborative editing and AI editors.
Outlines
🔒 The Rise of ProtonMail and Privacy-Focused Tech
The paragraph discusses the current state of tech companies, where many are involved in ethical controversies and lawsuits. It contrasts this with ProtonMail, a tech company that has been doing things 'right' and is gaining significant traction. ProtonMail was founded by CERN scientists in response to the Snowden revelations about government spying, aiming to provide end-to-end encryption for emails. The service automatically enables PGP encryption between its users, ensuring that even ProtonMail cannot read the content of the emails. The paragraph also touches on the limitations of ProtonMail when communicating with non-ProtonMail users and the company's open-source approach to building trust.
🚀 Proton's Expansion into a Privacy-Centric Ecosystem
This paragraph highlights Proton's evolution from a secure email provider to a comprehensive ecosystem of privacy-focused applications. After establishing ProtonMail, the company launched ProtonVPN, ProtonCalendar, and ProtonDrive, aiming to create a suite of productivity tools that prioritize user privacy. Proton also acquired SimpleLogin to enhance its services with email aliasing and introduced ProtonPass, a password manager. The paragraph emphasizes Proton's commitment to user privacy and its strategy to build an ecosystem that can compete with mainstream tech giants, noting the company's rapid development and feature releases, as well as its user growth and aggressive hiring, indicating solid expansion.
💼 Proton's Sustainable Business Model and Future Prospects
The final paragraph delves into Proton's business model, which has been sustainable and independent, allowing the company to grow without external investments. It contrasts Proton's model with competitors like Mozilla and Signal, which rely on donations or search engine partnerships. The paragraph also addresses concerns about Proton's ownership structure and its compliance with legal warrants, suggesting that while not perfect, Proton offers a solid balance of privacy features, user-friendly applications, and a robust ecosystem. The video concludes with a promotion for Brilliant, an online learning platform for STEM skills, which is sponsoring the video.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Proton
💡End-to-end encryption
💡PGP
💡Edward Snowden
💡Ecosystem
💡Scalability
💡Business Model
💡Mozilla
💡Signal
💡Network Effects
💡Open Source
Highlights
Tech companies are under scrutiny for prioritizing revenue over user privacy.
Google faces legal challenges for its data handling practices.
ProtonMail is highlighted as a tech company doing things right and gaining significance.
ProtonMail was founded by CERN scientists post-Snowden revelations to focus on encrypted email services.
ProtonMail offers end-to-end encryption using PGP by default, enhancing privacy.
ProtonMail's encryption ensures that even the company cannot read user emails.
ProtonMail's open-source clients allow users to verify the privacy of their emails.
Proton expanded its services beyond email to include VPN, calendar, and drive for a complete productivity suite.
Proton acquired SimpleLogin and integrated it into ProtonPass, enhancing email privacy.
ProtonDocs and ProtonWallet were launched, expanding Proton's ecosystem.
Proton's ecosystem is built with privacy in mind, controlling encryption from passwords to document editing.
Proton's user base is in the tens of millions, indicating significant market penetration.
Proton's growth is aggressive, with new features and services being launched frequently.
Proton's business model is sustainable, relying on subscription fees for premium features.
Proton's independence is ensured by not taking external investments, allowing long-term mission adherence.
Proton's ownership structure includes a foundation to ensure mission adherence, though transparency could be improved.
Proton complies with Swiss legal warrants, which has led to some privacy concerns.
Proton's ecosystem is user-friendly and competitive with mainstream services.
Proton's success is attributed to its privacy features, ecosystem, and sustainable business model.
Brilliant is an online learning platform that teaches STEM skills interactively.
Transcripts
tech companies these days are not
exactly belov it a federal judge has
just ruled against Google the doj is
suing app to maximize their own Revenue
they might have to put more ads on their
websites you're on National Television
would you like now to apologize to the
victims of course some of them are
fairly ethical but then those often end
up being Niche players who struggle to
build large sustainable businesses that
really move the needle for the masses
what if I told you that there was a tech
company that was not only doing more or
less everything right but was also
starting to become big enough to
actually matter let's talk about
[Music]
proton by the way this video was not
sponsored by proton they did not ask me
to make it I did not join their
affiliate program so that we don't have
any conflicts of interest and if
anything I've actually been sponsored by
some of their competitors in the past
instead this video is actually sponsored
by brilliant more about them at the end
when in 2013 Edward Snowden revealed
just how much governments were spying on
people demand for more encrypted
internet services suddenly exploded and
email became an obvious candidate in
need of Reform developed in the 70s and
' 80s email was notoriously insecure and
had no real privacy built in by default
encryption techniques such as pgp had
been invented but were far from
Universal since email is just a million
different mail servers operated by a
million different companies that have
agreed to exchange messages any
comprehensive change would require each
one of those to agree to a new standard
and to implement it correctly not only
does that make encryption for example
technically challenging it's also
unlikely to happen given that the
world's largest email provider is you
know also the world's largest
advertising company maybe that's not a
coincidence as proton co-founder NN said
the government wants to read it Google
wants to read it Microsoft wants to read
it your it admin wants to read it so in
this environment there was a pretty
obvious Market Gap that a new player
could exploit just one year after the
Snowden Revelations protom mail was
found founded by a bunch of scientists
from CERN you know the place in
Switzerland where they make very small
particles go room room in a very big
circle and the idea was to make an email
service that offered real endtoend
encryption using pgp while also being
just as easy to use as Gmail or hot mail
pgp or pretty good privacy was invented
in 1991 but setting it up requires users
to manually exchange and set up long
strings of characters called keys with
each contact which means that it never
became truly widely adopted proton male
just turned pgp on automatically by
default between all proton mail users
meaning that proton itself couldn't
actually read that amazing secret recipe
that your grandma emailed you as long as
you both used proton mail now with that
you might have already noticed a pretty
obvious limitation of this service when
two people talk both of them need to
keep a secret in order for that secret
to remain a secret but if the other
party used any other email provider
proton couldn't actually enforce privacy
proton of course open sourced their
clients so you could be sure that they
didn't read your emails but for example
Google's official policy until 2017 was
to just read every email in a person's
Gmail inbox in order to Target ads at
their users there's not much proton can
do there overall then proton mail was a
more trustworthy email solution that
what came before it but obviously far
from a perfect solution so why do I
think this company is worth talking
about anyway well to start with as
imperfect as email inherently is it is
still necessary as the first step
towards a larger ecosystem email
provides identity and you can build a
bunch of other services around it which
is exactly what happened next even back
in 2016 founder Andy Yen said that quote
right now we're focusing on email but
you have the entire space of different
applications that can go to the endtoend
encrypted model and so in 2017 they
launched the now very popular proton VPN
and soon after they launched proton
calendar and Proton Drive to complete
the big productivity Trio then they
acquired simple login which is an email
aliasing tool and they rolled that into
their next big product proton pass a
great password manager that could now
also create email aliases on the Fly
just a few months ago they then bought
standard notes a Notes app that they're
integrating into their portfolio as we
speak and they also launched proton docs
which as You' expect is a document
editor much like Google Docs and
meanwhile their latest launch is proton
wallet which is an app that helps you
keep Bitcoin physically on your device
instead of on some online exchange
having a central service like email at
the core was a key enabler for this
ecosystem buildup and while email itself
might be inherently imperfect the whole
rest of the ecosystem proton has
basically complete control over and so
they can build those to be as private as
possible everything from your passwords
and proton pass to your keystrokes and
proton docks to your photos being
uploaded to Proton Drive everything is
encrypted and basically all of these
apps are also open source being able to
offer not just a single app for a narrow
use case but basically a whole
productivity ecosystem that could
theoretically replace something like the
Google apps for a person is a big deal
it's also the first major differentiator
between proton and the other kind of
ethical tech companies now personally
I'm still missing some things from the
proton ecosystem like a spreadsheets and
presentation app on top of docks
standard notes is just way too basic for
my use case Proton Drive doesn't handle
large files super smoothly Etc but
looking at their timeline you can
clearly see them accelerating the new
releases aggressively lately and the
same goes for new features too just in
the last few months we got real-time
collaborative editing in docs automatic
photo backups for Proton Drive and even
an AI editor called scribe which can run
entirely locally on your machine and
won't actually use your data for
training either pretty slick well and
perhaps most importantly apart from
minor annoyances all of these apps
actually work just as well and are just
as easy to figure out as their less
private competitors if the goal is to
make not just apps that are private but
also apps that can theoretically be used
by hundreds of millions of people around
the world then I think it is completely
non-negotiable to have really good ease
of use and also a full ecosystem that
the people are used to and I think
proton is way further ahead with this
than any of its competitors and this
shows in the numbers too while proton
does not publish exact figures they do
claim that over a 100 million people
have signed up across the various proton
Services while 50,000 people have joined
proton 2 now to be fair it's a little
bit hard to say how many of those people
and businesses are still using proton
today on similar web I can see that the
proton me domain gets a 40 to 50 million
visits a month while protonvpn dcom for
example gets 4 to 5 million the company
has many more domains and clearly many
people will also be using the mobile
apps instead of the websites so user
numbers are imprecise but the point is
that users have to be in the tens of
millions and this is not some
insignificant tiny player we also know
that in 2021 they claimed to have had 50
million signups so they must have at
least doubled those in 3 years and
looking at their career page they're
hiring pretty aggressively too which
also implies very solid growth I think
achieving anything like real scale is
proton's second big achievement and it's
really important for two big reasons
first only having scale allows them to
invest into actually building an
ecosystem of apps that can properly
compete with the big players and second
scale is tremendously important for
Network effects proton male as we've
said is only private if the people
around you are also using proton mail
while proton docks for example will
become truly powerful when we can expect
to send a link to them to random people
and expect them to edit it just like we
can with Google Docs or Microsoft Word
proton is still in the beginnings of
this but they seem to be accelerating
and they're already way further than any
of their competitors and meanwhile their
third differentiator is their business
model the company got started in 2014
with a crowdfunding campaign where they
claimed that 10,000 people donated over
half a million dollars to launch
development and right after that they
switched to Simply making users pay a
subscription fee at least for premium
features seems like a pretty obvious
business model but it's one that very
few of their privacy focused competitors
have managed to pull off at scale
Mozilla is an obvious open- Source
privacy Champion with hundreds of
millions of users who has even launched
a few paid attempts but looking at their
latest statement 86% of their revenues
last year still came from Google simply
paying them to be the default search
engine in Firefox Google is not only
milla's biggest competitor with chrome
but they also just lost a massive
Anti-Trust lawsuit in the United States
which might force them to stop paying
for default search engine placement in
for example competing browsers like
Mozilla that decision hasn't been made
yet but either way this is a Dangerously
unsustainable business model and
similarly signal is a free app and is
funded almost completely by donations
from regular users including me and
while they have been able to collect a
significant amount it doesn't actually
seem to be quite enough to offset their
costs and the president of signal even
claims that their expenses might reach
about $50 million next year the Gap in
funding for now is plugged by zero
interest rate loans from Rich
philanthropists like the WhatsApp
founder Brian Acton which I guess is
nice but it again raises the question of
sustainability what if the
philanthropists decide that they don't
want to fund it any further what if the
service grows can fold and suddenly have
massive costs who knows compared to
these proton having a simple sustainable
business model that works and has worked
for a decade is pretty unique especially
in the open source world where things
are often expected to be free it allows
proton to comfortably remain independent
long term proton is a private company
that doesn't have to reveal its finances
but based on the fact that they haven't
taken any massive Investments externally
this means that by definition there's a
state able financially and my rough
estimate based on you know this is just
a guess based on their numbers is that
they probably make something like1 to
$200 million a year that's obviously not
even remotely on the scale of like a
Google for example but it's also not bad
and also if we're right about the fact
that they doubled their business in the
last 3 years sounds pretty good now
after my three major highlights I also
wanted to mention two areas where I
think proton is not quite perfect then
the first one is its ownership structure
see companies like Mozilla and Signal
are Own 100% by a nonprofit Foundation
as a parent this ensures full adherence
to the mission long term and recently
proton have put out a block post
announcing that they to have established
a proton foundation with a similar goal
so that's a good thing but since I'm
nitpicking here I think the details of
the proton deal are not quite as clear
as they should be they do say that the
foundation was gifted enough shares by
three of its co-founders and early
employees to become quote the largest
voting shareholder of proton now I
understand not going to 100% for example
as it allows for for key employees to be
given shares and to be incentivized that
way but they didn't actually see how
much the foundation has the largest
shareholder could have anything 10% 50%
90% we just don't know I've checked the
Swiss company registry which is where
proton is headquartered but I couldn't
find any information about the ownership
split there either they explicitly
claimed that the foundation is legally
obligated to ensuring permanent
adherence to the mission of proton but
without the ownership Stakes we don't
actually know what powers it has to to
do this the only explicit power that
they mentioned is that they can block
hostile takeovers so I guess it has a
veto right but no other mechanisms were
given I did actually ask proton for a
comment and they gave me this as a
response which you can pause and read if
you like anyway I don't think this is a
Smoking Gun like a private company does
not have to declare its exact
shareholder structure to Outsiders but I
do think that for a company that really
wants its users to trust it and they
want as far as to create a foundation
for that to create user trust I think
even more transparency would be useful
and meanwhile the second complaint which
hardcore privacy enthusiasts sometimes
bring up is that proton officially
complies with legal warrants from Swiss
authorities this has led to some
unfortunate cases in the past like a
French activist being exposed by proton
handing over their IP addresses to the
authorities for example proton claims
that they had to comply by law as any
Swiss company would have and that the
only things that they could share was
metadata not the actual contents of
emails for example which of course were
encrypted I do think there's a debate to
be had about how much comp should comply
with legal requests but honestly I'll
leave that debate to people who know
more about the law than I do the only
thing that I can say is that for my
threat model this feels okay in the
grand scheme of things I think the solid
privacy features combined with the easy
to ouse apps the powerful ecosystem and
the sustainable business model do add up
to a combination that I think make
proton a uniquely impressive company now
whether it's at proton or some other
tech company I think being one of the
people who gets to build systems like
this is a really cool job and if you
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[Music]
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