this post was submitted on 29 Apr 2025
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Indian court orders blocking of Proton Mail (techcrunch.com)
submitted 8 months ago by neme@lemm.ee to c/technology@lemmy.zip
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[–] ohwhatfollyisman@lemmy.world 42 points 8 months ago (2 children)

following a legal complaint filed by New Delhi-based M Moser Design Associates. The local firm alleged that its employees had received emails containing obscene and vulgar content sent via Proton Mail.

in January, the New Delhi-based firm called for the regulation or blocking of Proton Mail in India, as the email service reportedly refused to share details about the sender of the allegedly offensive emails, despite a police complaint.

this has nothing to do with encryption services offered by proton. any email provider could fall into this pitfall.

[–] floofloof@lemmy.ca 9 points 8 months ago

Unless this is being used as a pretext to block a service they wanted to block anyway for other reasons.

[–] davidgro@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Wouldn't most other providers just give up the senders' details immediately?

(Edit: less absolute)

[–] ohwhatfollyisman@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

i haven't seen any data to that effect.

[–] davidgro@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

I rather thought that was one of the main selling points of the Proton services.

[–] deegeese@sopuli.xyz 23 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Can India even block ProtonMail if the users also have ProtonVPN?

[–] Dudewitbow@lemmy.zip 9 points 8 months ago (2 children)

could they theoretically just block protonvpns ip range at an isp level?

[–] deegeese@sopuli.xyz 16 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

If you start blocking VPNs you are cutting off your country from most telework/outsourcing because corporations need VPNs to their branch offices.

This is an acceptable trade off for Russia, probably not for India.

[–] Dudewitbow@lemmy.zip 13 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

you dont block off all vpns, the ips proton vpn uses. vpns in china work the same way.. not all vpns work in china, but they do exist

[–] Bldck@beehaw.org 7 points 8 months ago

A state level block on protonvpn would be at the IP block level based on known, published exit nodes.

Corporate VPNs are point to point and would not be impacted

[–] untakenusername@sh.itjust.works 1 points 8 months ago

I think protonmail can work with tor

[–] iknowitwheniseeit@lemmynsfw.com 2 points 8 months ago

The article is not very clear, but my interpretation is that this is about the e-mails sent from Proton Mail, not users being able to access the Proton Mail web site.

A VPN won't help you if the server for the recipient of the e-mail drops the e-mail.

So, basically imagine that all Internet service providers in India have to block any e-mail from @proton.me and not deliver them. I think that's the idea.

[–] dil@hexbear.net 15 points 8 months ago (1 children)

its employees had received emails containing obscene and vulgar content sent via Proton Mail.

the email service reportedly refused to share details about the sender of the allegedly offensive emails, despite a police complaint.

Last year, the police department of the southern state of Tamil Nadu had sought to block Proton Mail after the email service was found to have been used for sending hoax bomb threats to local schools.

Honestly, pretty glowing review of Proton Mail

[–] shawn1122@lemm.ee 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Bomb threats to local schools were also being sent via Proton.

If they aren't going to help deal with that then I can understand why turning them off and figuring out is the next best step.

Other services likely engage with local authorities when illegal activity is pursued in their platform.

[–] dil@hexbear.net 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

I'm not saying "yay, it's morally good to send bomb threats."

Folks who care about privacy don't want their email provider engaging with local authorities.

when tyranny becomes law rebellion becomes duty

"Illegal" is NOT immoral, and when laws are increasingly being passed by right-wing nutjobs, folks doing the right thing will be doing illegal things.

  • women getting access to an abortion
  • undocumented folks avoiding being sent to El Salvador
  • trans folks getting healthcare

Any platform has three options:

  1. Always comply with law enforcement, and give up vulnerable populations that are targeted by the government
  2. Never comply with law enforcement, and make law enforcement track down bomb threats some other way
  3. Sometimes comply with law enforcement, based on... what criteria? where's the line?

3 is obviously the thing we'd like, but no company is going to open itself up to legal threats by doing it.

This article shows that Proton Mail is falling into category 2. I think that category should exist to protect vulnerable populations.

[–] shawn1122@lemm.ee 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

I see where you're coming from but I think that line can be drawn by people with a moral compass, which I understand America is failing at right now.

I truly believe most people can distinguish between threatening to bomb children and any of the examples you've listed but perhaps I'm giving people too much of a benefit of the doubt.

[–] dil@hexbear.net 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

There are plenty of people that think that each of those things are morally wrong, and some who would say that they're much worse than a bomb threat.

Those people are writing the laws.

Legality and morality are two completely different things. It's a comfortable lie to think they're the same.

Having an email provider that will not comply with law enforcement is important because any of us could be next on the target list.

[–] rumba@lemmy.zip 1 points 8 months ago

Nah, they outed a French activist due to a court order. Maybe they're learning though....

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 15 points 8 months ago

India is scaring me

[–] untakenusername@sh.itjust.works 11 points 8 months ago

this is effectively an endorsement for the rest of the world

[–] XaetaCore@lemmy.xaetacore.net 8 points 8 months ago

Honestly this is the text book definition of: "We do not understand anything about the technology so just ban it all together" They are completely missing the point that its a GDPR compliant privacy focused platform, Of course people are going to abuse that.

But to enact such a draconian measure is foolish imho.