ProtonMail and Anonymity

[Jeff Allen]

On 5/5/19 1:36 PM, Stefan Claas wrote:
> On Sun, 5 May 2019 11:22:56 -0400
> Tony Lane <codeguro at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> Isn't it obvious?
> 
> I don't think so! Users new to privacy related
> services may think when visiting the ProtonMail
> site that they are anonymous, when seeing their
> main page:
> 
> https://protonmail.com/
> 

I suppose like anything else it all comes down to whether you believe
them or not.  I do.

Here is ProtonMail's explanation of what they do with the personally
identifiable information collected during registration:

"If you are presented with Email or SMS verification, we only save a
cryptographic hash of your email or phone number which is not
permanently associated with the account that you create. Because hash
functions are one way functions, it is impossible to derive your phone
number or email from that hash. However, using the same phone number
will result in obtaining the same cryptographic hash, so by comparing
hashes, we can detect re-use of phone number or email addresses for
human verification."

The reasons behind ProtonMail signup procedures are more fully expained
at https://protonmail.com/support/knowledge-base/human-verification/

HTH,

Jeff

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