Indian court orders blocking of Proton Mail
99 comments
·April 29, 2025naughtyfinch
JumpCrisscross
> On paper we are free citizens, but essentially we never seem to get the benefits of living in a free country
India has been mimicking Chinese and Gulf authoritarianism for a decade now. New Delhi is not truly authoritarian, but more an an elected federal government with autocratic powers, not dissimilar from the U.S. Both are mimicking China, to a certain extent, in ways good (industrial policy, moderating hyperindividualism like NIMBYism) and bad (suspending habeus, jingoism).
lurkshark
This seems ineffective on a couple levels. One is that Proton users are a population that’s much more likely to be using a VPN anyway (they even offer a VPN service themselves). Another is that unless non-blocked providers reject email from Proton this doesn’t even solve the supposed issue. An Indian user of GMail is going to still receive and view email sent by Proton, so the goal of the block isn’t even achieved.
JumpCrisscross
The point isn’t to block Proton as much as give prosecutors and investigators another tool to either target folks or simplify prosecution. If a search reveals a Proton email address (or you can show someone using one), you’re done.
gruez
>If a search reveals a Proton email address (or you can show someone using one), you’re done.
But so far as I can tell, using protonmail isn't illegal yet?
JumpCrisscross
> so far as I can tell, using protonmail isn't illegal yet?
Not an expert on Indian law. But we have a court order blocking Proton Mail across India. Circumventing the block could be found tantamount to wilfully violating the court order.
JCattheATM
Steps like this are all the more reason the decentralized internet has to start being given more priority. It's only a matter of time until the open internet stops being a thing.
rad_gruchalski
That’s a pipe dream. Like „untraceable, not-controlled-by-banks, decentralised currency bitcoin“. As soon as it becomes popular, it gets regulated.
Yes, it’s stupid. But it’s the reality of things.
tremon
Regulated and decentralized are not opposing ends on the same spectrum, under a mature government one can have both.
JumpCrisscross
> Regulated and decentralized are not opposing ends on the same spectrum, under a mature government one can have both
The point is it's regulated irrespective of the government's maturity. If it only works under a mature government, it's superfluous as a social tool. (Technology usually is.)
null
vlan0
And how exactly would that work?
freeopinion
Would you care to remind everybody how they can guarantee that the party they are interacting with is in fact Proton even though anybody watching or facilitating the interaction won't be able to know?
bloppe
Good publicity for proton mail
ujkhsjkdhf234
Sounds like an endorsement of Proton Mail to me.
sangeeth96
Related but India has been on a slow march to becoming a totalitarian surveillance state. Recently, we got public confirmation on govt. having backdoor access to WhatsApp to surveil on citizens when the FM talked about the Income Tax dept. scanning WhatsApp messages to catch offenders: https://m.economictimes.com/wealth/tax/is-the-government-alr...
Brybry
That article doesn't confirm an Indian government WhatsApp backdoor?
> Due to WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption, messages sent between two users are only readable by them; even the service provider cannot decrypt the contents of the messages. This prevents any third party, including service providers (WhatsApp, Telegram), from accessing the messages
> no verified evidence to suggest that the government is directly accessing private WhatsApp chats
> WhatsApp itself does not store message content, and it explicitly states that it cannot and does not produce the contents of user messages in response to any government request
Reading between the lines, it sounds like they're getting encrypted chat content directly from the phones (and also metadata from providers).
rlpb
I can't comment on what they're doing or not doing. But if they're getting chat content directly from the phones, say for example by having arranged with the app to cooperate with that exfiltration, then that is, by definition, a back door.
loufe
You must admit the way GP framed it strongly implies Meta gave the Indian government carte blanche access to intercept decrypted messages. That is a massive, order-of-magnitude different story than the Indian Gov't hacking phones (installing spyware, etc.) to exfiltrate messages decrypted on device. They are very different stories with very different implications.
(edit: you weren't GP)
gruez
>But if they're getting chat content directly from the phones, say for example by having arranged with the app to cooperate with that exfiltration, then that is, by definition, a back door.
Keyword being "if". There's no indication such backdoors exist, as opposed to something like malware being placed, or the phone being physically being tampered with.
perching_aix
A backdoor would be a feature of the service (be it on server or clientside) that'd explicitly allow for data exfiltration. The service provider complying with metadata requests and having vulnerabilities in their software are not backdoors, unless you can demonstrate that the metadata are oversharing info, or that the vulnerabilities are intentional.
giancarlostoro
Isn't the end to end encryption just not a default setting? It could be as easy as that.
sangeeth96
I mean, right above the stuff you quoted, there is mention that govt. does now have the provision to access under exceptional circumstances:
> However, as Ashish Mishra, Partner-Cyber Security, NangiaNXT notes, “As of now, the government has the provision to access the encrypted messages under certain exceptions such as legal request, court matters, surveillance, and criminal investigations. The DPDP (Digital Personal Data Protection) Act, along with the Telegraph Act and IT Act, gives the government power to request such data from service providers.”
Given the general attitude towards digital privacy from the govt, I think it’s safe to assume they do have means to request.
That’s not the only incident to draw this conclusion from btw: https://www.business-standard.com/india-news/supreme-court-s...
gruez
It's unclear whether the government actually have the ability to read/intercept e2e messages, or merely declared they have the right to. That's an important distinction, because the government can declare it has the right to access such messages, without the service providers (ie. whatsapp) being able to follow through with it. We've seen something similar in uk, where a bill passed a few years ago gave the government the right to access encrypted data, and forced tech companies to provide access, but Apple didn't actually implement a backdoor. They instead decided to (very loudly) disable encryption entirely for the uk market.
zkmon
The trick the government has found is, just saying that gov can access messages is enough to make 99% of the whatsapp users to believe it, and make them scared of using tech for any goofy stuff. Why take risk? - wins always.
triknomeister
Majority Indian citizen understand this but this is a risk they are willing to take against the pervasive corruption (almost 60 years). Whether it actually leads to reduction in corruption is of course debatable.
TehCorwiz
Giving the people responsible for corruption more power to suppress speech and communication will not stop corruption. It just gives them new tools to entrench themselves.
DaSHacka
Giving the government more unchecked power reduces corruption?
JumpCrisscross
> Giving the government more unchecked power reduces corruption?
It's a weirdly-effective pitch! ("Drain the swamp.")
The stupidity of it is compounded by the fact that it's often not about giving the government unchecked power, but a subset of the powerful unchecked power.
crop_rotation
Do you honestly believe that ? Almost all government adjacent people (politicians/ civil servants) own land holdings way beyond their means. Everyone knows that everywhere. If the government wants to crack down on corruption there is extreme low hanging fruit that doesn't require big brother watching you.
crop_rotation
I mean this is just absurd.
> On Tuesday, the Karnataka High Court directed the Indian government to block Proton Mail, a popular email service known for its enhanced security, 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.
How does this make any sense. Would the court block gmail if the same happens via gmail?.
India somehow is stuck in the worst of all worlds. There is no freedom like democratic countries and there is no good government like China.
To any westerners commenting, this is not same as think of the children. Government or courts mostly don't even need to give such excuses in India (max they might say to counter traitors). There is obscene amount of corruption in the country at every step from the local to the highest, and it is internalized by the citizens so much that everyone knows and nobody cares.
Edit: good government above means competent government
luotuoshangdui
> Good government like China
This is a bad joke. For starters, China blocked Proton Mail years ago.
crop_rotation
I am not claiming China is free or democratic at all, just that Government in turn is able to use it's authoritarianism to do stuff for the country.
indoordin0saur
FYI, a good term for this is "state capacity"
l33tfr4gg3r
If that's what you really believe, then I'd say Chinese government propaganda is working as intended.
keybored
What’s the relevance of authoritarianism? Is it necessary for the good government or is it neutral or other?
duxup
Every government is busy with some form of "do stuff for the country".
Yeul
Chinese infrastructure is light years ahead of India and frankly a police surveillance state does make the streets safe.
tehjoker
Protonmail did not comply with Chinese law. I can't say I'm a fan, but this wasn't targeted at Protonmail, it was the same with Google. China requires this because China is a target for U.S. imperialism and must protect itself. The internet, mainly owned by the USA, is basically like radio free asia dot com.
Protecting Chinese technology firms also allowed China to grow highly competitive national companies, a phenomenon we don't see as much anywhere US technology companies were allowed free reign.
> The applicable Chinese law is the China Internet Security Law which came into force in 2017. The law essentially stipulates that foreign companies which operate in China and process the private information of Chinese citizens, must store such data in China and make it available to Chinese authorities upon request. An example of a company which has had to comply with this law is Apple, which has extensive operations in China. A similar law went into effect in Russia back in 2015 (known as Federal Law No. 242-FZ).
Hnrobert42
Explain how the "internet [is] mainly owned by the USA."
The robust Chinese technology sector is no doubt a reflection of smart and industrious Chinese people. Those smart and industrious people include those in the CPC engaged in wholesale industrial espionage.
umvi
> there is no good government like China
Here "good" means "is competent and calculating" I suppose. China's government wouldn't even blink blocking Proton Mail or any other non-Chinese technology without even giving a reason, though.
crop_rotation
Yeah that is a good tradeoff (IMHO) if it gives the citizens a tradeoff of infrastructure and social services. Indian government can jump through hoops to do the same thing but somehow can never do all that when it comes to rapid infrastructure development.
__rito__
> "[...] never do all that when it comes to rapid infrastructure development."
India is now building 100 km highway per day. It created 24,000+ km in the last 5 years. [0]
It has the second-largest road network in the world, second only to the US. [1]
[0]: https://pib.gov.in/PressNoteDetails.aspx?NoteId=151963&Modul...
[1]: https://www.financialexpress.com/business/roadways-indias-ro...
IAmBroom
Yes, "completely different from China's government" is really what's meant.
crop_rotation
No, I did mean "competent"
m4rtink
Yeah, that would be like the football lobby forcing the blocking of Cloudflare just because someone used it for unauthorized football streaming!
ricardo81
Interesting. As a Brit, I imagine (possibly ideally) by the time I'm an old man in 20-30 years that India will be a beacon of democracy and freedom in the East, given its historical Western ties and a large English speaking population.
But your argument against their ruling speaks for itself, IMO.
There will come a point where India has to lead on this kind of thing.
sashank_1509
India is as the commenter said, the worst of both worlds. The government managed to drive a comedian into hiding, for a make a crude (non political) joke about sex with parents. The government drove another comedian into hiding, for making a political joke and closed down the bar where he was performing, for the sole crime of hosting him. The government regularly censors movies, bans books, censors speech etc. At the same time we get no development, the drain outside my house is still not covered. It’s just arbitrary authoritarianism on the most pointless use cases.
India should have just been given to a monarch who liked the country and its people unlike the British or the Mughals
blitzar
I thought this 20-30 years ago.
alephnerd
India's legal system is based on the paternalistic British judicial system from the mid-19th to mid-20th century.
India, Malaysia, and Singapore all share the same common judicial origins because they were forked off in the 1940s to 1960s, and never saw the reforms that the UK, Canada, Australia, and NZ saw in the 1980s-90s.
Furthermore, civil libertarianism is more of an American judicial innovation, and even European countries are aligned with the primacy of the state over platforms.
ricardo81
A pretty good starting point considering the USA constitution was based much off Scotland's enlightenment 200 years prior.
noxs
People often underestimate how much impact the education of certain aspect (Infrastructure in China and Democracy in Westerner countries) has made to their values to a government, and meanwhile the education is controlled by the government to certain degree.
DesiLurker
people with get stuck on 'good govt china..' but I get what you mean. moving on to core message. Indian courts are some of the dumbest, red-tape laden, corrupt entities out there. for westerners, its common for basic things like property disputes or even divorces to run for decades (yes -s plural). In India the legal process is itself a punishment. plus there is no consistency in case law or precedent. people often purjur themselves and walk around like nothing. it really is free for all with Indian judiciary so I am not surprised at-all that they will do something stupid like this.
sangeeth96
> Would the court block gmail if the same happens via gmail?.
I mean, G will happily cough up the data and so will other big corps. Proton doesn’t… unless they go through the Swiss relationship route?
But this decision is stupid and harmful regardless.
briandear
> no good government like China // good government means competent government
As someone that lived in China for 5 years, competent is the last adjective I’d use.
Sichuan Earthquake —> https://circa.art/ai-weiwei-recapturing-the-tragedy/
The Shanghai Lockdown —> https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-59890533.amp
Local Chinese government corruption —> https://thediplomat.com/2025/03/how-local-corruption-evolved...
Tai Lake pollution —> https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/taihu-green-wash-or...
Land seizures —> https://rightsandresources.org/blog/the-guardian-chinese-vil...
Xinjiang —> https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/china-xinjiang-uyghurs-musl...
One could call China’s government competent the same way one could say Stalin was a competent administrator. Nazis were also very “competent” and efficient. In no universe should that be considered “good government.”
sashank_1509
It really is between 2 choices:
1. An authoritarian government that can actually do things but also mess up and be harsh against anyone opposing it - China
2. A democratic government that can’t get anything done, citizens can’t rely on police for any crimes, courts for any justice, politicians for any development, where the politics of the nation just constantly seeks to divide on basis of caste, religion, language etc, and the nation as a whole wallows in mediocrity.
musicale
For a moment I thought you might be the Brian Dear who wrote The Friendly Orange Glow (a fascinating history of the PLATO system).
JCharante
Don't they already block internet access to certain regions in order to slow down the spread of information? I'm not very surprised by these actions.
josefritzishere
I never wanted a Proton email address before now.
dokyun
You probably still don't want one, given they've been known to divulge user info to various authorities in the past.
tristan957
How do you expect businesses to operate if they do not comply with legal requirements?
Proton is obligated to cooperate with authorities just like any other company. Proton has a distinction in that it also takes certain cases to court when it argues there is no legal justification.
iLoveOncall
Are those essentially just sham cases orchestrated by the government to justify blocking an encrypted service?
It seems like such an insane over-reaction to an absolute non-issue.
shash
Doubtful. The petitioner in this case is an international architecture firm, hardly a typical group to be used for a sham case. The judgement itself isn’t out so we can’t see the court’s reasoning.
This is a bit more comprehensive: https://www.barandbench.com/amp/story/news/karnataka-high-co... and the Delhi case in which the ban is previously mentioned is only peripherally about email (the mail used by one of the parties is proton). The court makes an observation there that it should already have been banned so how is it still around.
hengheng
The built-in overreach makes it look like a structure set up in a way that encourage corruption, even though it won't happen in this case and is likely not even intended.
kburman
India lack technical capability to decrypt web traffic at scale or power to force companies to do it for them. Like what happened with Apple and Telegram.
So this is what they come up with.
_blk
...Just use Proton VPN to access Proton Mail ;)
I have been using Proton Mail and Proton VPN for over 3 years now. I firmly believe in the fundamental right of privacy online. Indian government has been taking steps like these for quite some time now. They previously asked VPN companies to log and gather every bit of information they could about their users including their name and address (effectively driving all VPN companies out of India) Sometimes, I question the meaning of freedom in India. On paper we are free citizens, but essentially we never seem to get the benefits of living in a free country.