🔑 Why Privacy Matters (Even if Google Knows Everything) — with Patricia Egger, Head of Security for Proton

Amelia HrubyHey there, off the grid listeners. Amelia here popping in before this episode with a special announcement. Come to class, which is my three day workshop intensive, where I will teach you how to teach and sell online with competence and care, has been rescheduled for June fourth, fifth, and sixth. You probably heard me talking about it here on the podcast in May, and I had to push the dates because my beloved dog, Zoe, sadly passed away the week that come to class was going to happen, and I just couldn't teach in those immediate moments of grief. So I rescheduled come to class for the beginning of June, and I added even more support if you'd like to join us.

Amelia HrubySo this is just a very quick message to invite you to head to the show notes and check out come to class. You have until the end of May to sign up. It's going to be a great time. And since it had to be rescheduled, you can still join. Again, head to the link in the show notes to sign up.

Amelia HrubyNow, let's get into this episode.

Speaker 1Okay. Let's go off the grid. Okay. Let's go off the grid. Okay.

Speaker 1I know that you really wanna put your phone away. Yeah. Okay.

Amelia HrubyHello, and welcome to Off the Grid, a podcast about sharing your work and life online without handing everything over to big tech surveillance. I'm your host, Amelia Frooby, and we are currently in season nine of Off the Grid. I have brought you over 150 episodes of this show, and I am so thrilled to be doing something today that I have never done before, which is talking to someone at one of the tech companies that I most admire. In today's episode, I'm speaking to Patricia Ager, who is the head of security at Proton. Proton is a privacy focused tech company that offers tools like ProtonMail, Proton Calendar, Proton Drive.

Amelia HrubyYou might notice from that list that they are providing privacy focused alternatives to many of the tools that Google offers. And so when I work with folks to help them leave Google, Proton is typically my first recommendation for where they might go next. I don't have any formal sponsorship or partnership relationship with Proton at all, but I was thrilled to have Patricia on the podcast to talk about Proton's approach to security and privacy by default, how we can all better protect our digital activity and presence, why we love ProtonMail and do want you to use it. And, yes, I do have a referral link in the show notes. It'll get you a free trial and a discount on their fanciest plan, and I will receive a small payout if you use it.

Amelia HrubySo if you love the show and you wanna try ProtonMail, check out our link in the show notes to get in there. Patricia and I also talk about Proton's new Born Private initiative, which is something that they're doing this month to allow parents to claim email addresses for their kids in exchange for a $1 donation to the Proton Foundation. So when you take part in the Born Private initiative, you can claim an email address for a young person, and then it will stay locked and encrypted for fifteen years so that it will be there waiting for them when they're ready to have their own email address. And they can do that through Proton. At the end of our conversation, we also get into some of the problems with privacy and AI chatbots.

Amelia HrubyWe talk a little bit about Proton's privacy focused AI tool, Lumo, and more about how all of us could use to be more careful with what we are telling these AI tools we're using if you're using them. I know that many off the grid listeners are not, but if you are, make sure you listen to the end because Patricia has some very professional head of security thoughts on how AI is infiltrating our private lives. I'm so excited to bring you this conversation today and really grateful to Patricia for taking the time to speak with me. If listening to this episode has you feeling like, wow, I think it really is time for me to move over to ProtonMail, try out some of these privacy focused services. As we recommend, take some tiny steps, one tool at a time to shift the tech that you're using away from ad sponsored models, if you

Patricia Eggerfeel that after listening to this episode?

Amelia HrubyI have created a workshop for you. It's called Opt Out Five Steps to Break Up with Big Tech Today. It includes a ninety minute workshop that takes you from totally overwhelmed by the idea of a tech swap to confident about how to step away from Meta, Google, and more. It also includes a tech swap planning and progress worksheet in a PDF form and Notion template. So you can walk yourself through the process of making these changes, and a curated list of tech tools and resources, so that you know what are the things that I recommend.

Amelia HrubyIf you wanna stop using Google search, if you wanna stop using ChatGPT, what are the alternates that I have looked at and vetted for you? All of that is included with the opt out workshop and it's only $49 to get everything there and more because there's a fun five day challenge for leaving social media included as well. So if you want to step back or away from big tech, then I made Opt Out specifically for you. It's meant to be a really affordable and supportive resource, and you can find it at offthegrid.funoptout, which is also linked in the show notes. Thank you so much for tuning into the podcast.

Amelia HrubyThank you for taking this time to think about your online privacy. It matters so much, more than you might even expect, as you're gonna hear in today's episode. So for now, let's dive in, shall we, to my conversation with Patricia Ager, head of security at Proton. Hi, Patricia. Welcome to Off the Grid.

Patricia EggerHi. Thank you so much for having me.

Amelia HrubyAs listeners know, I'm a big fan of Proton, and I recommend all of your products all the time. Could you start off by telling us a bit about your role at Proton?

Patricia EggerYeah. Sure. So I'm the head current head of security at Proton, and I recently also took over the internal IT function. So it's basically a team together of about 15 people, and we are tasked with basically keeping Proton safe from a broad range of different things that could go wrong from attackers to people making mistakes and and that kind of thing.

Amelia HrubyI wanna talk to you today about privacy and security, and I'd love to start with the Proton slogan, privacy by default. Could you talk about what that means in practice and how it shapes Proton's approach to privacy online?

Patricia EggerBasically what it what it means is that you do not need to be an expert or you do not need to have any kind of particular skills or knowledge in tech or in encryption or any of these things in order to be able to to use the services and to get, you know, have your privacy ensured by that. And so that's that's really what Proton is for. It's it's privacy for everyone. You don't you don't you don't need to pay extra for it or it's, you know, it's part of it's part of the product. And anybody, really, anybody who knows how to use an email or a VPN, gets that protection by default.

Amelia HrubyIt's something that's so overlooked in the way that, like, I didn't realize it was missing from so many of the tools I was using until Proton made me aware. Like, oh, I'm not getting privacy by default elsewhere. I wanted to ask you about the difference as well between privacy and security because, you know, I think a lot about privacy online, but I know your title is head of security. So what is, like, the similarity or difference between those things?

Patricia EggerIt's a good question, and there is overlap for sure, but they are kind of different things. And depending on who you talk to and even what the context of the conversation is, you, you, you might get a slightly different answer. But the way I like to see it for Proton is Proton cannot ensure our, our users' privacy if the company's security is not in check. And so that's that's my that's my job is to make sure that the company, you know, doesn't get hacked or nothing goes wrong so that we can make sure that our users' data remains private. And that really means for me, privacy is that you have control over your data.

Patricia EggerSo you decide who you share it with. It's not it's not necessarily, like, not sharing it with anybody, but it's the you have the dis you you choose, and you explicitly, you know, share with certain people and don't share with others. And that's that's entirely in your control in an easy way. And that that's privacy. Whereas security is, like, a it's a broader topic where, of course, confidentiality is in a certain aspect of that, and that's kind of the same thing where it's like I choose who I share my information with.

Patricia EggerBut there's a lot more or there's a lot of different aspects to security that that I don't think you would necessarily find in privacy such as, like, you know, not not getting hacked is not necessarily the same thing than maintaining your, you know, the privacy of your emails, for instance.

Amelia HrubyYeah. I really appreciate that explanation because I think what's making sense for me is, like, I will say I'm concerned with privacy. But unless that is, like, on a foundation of security, like, I can use an encrypted email service or have a very secure password. But if I'm doing that with a tool that doesn't have any security protocols or that is being hacked all the time, I may not be as protected as I think. Is that sort of a way to understand this?

Patricia EggerI think they they play off each other a bit as well. So our emails, right, are are private. They're encrypted. We don't even we as a company do not have access to them. That's that's the privacy aspect of it.

Patricia EggerBut the security aspect of it would be you have a password in order to get into that account. That's more of a security thing. And and ideally, if you really wanna protect yourself, you would have a second factor. So an app or a sec like a hardware token or something extra in addition to your password. And so that would be the security aspect of it.

Patricia EggerAnd so you cannot have the privacy of your the contents of your inbox if your password is weak or if you don't have a second factor or you don't have a password, I mean, you can't do that anymore with Proton. But you could imagine that if we didn't require users to have a password, then, you know, anybody who had your username could log in. So that's how they're you know, you you can't really have one without the other, but they're not exactly the same thing.

Amelia HrubyThank you for clarifying. That makes so much sense. I think it also bridges into my next question, which is, you know, a lot of listeners of Off the Grid arrive here just beginning to think about digital identity and privacy. Where do you suggest they begin? Like, I'm know that signing up for all the Proton Suite is a good starting point, but I'm more curious, like, are there specific things you'd recommend or some behavioral shifts that you think make a big difference for our digital privacy and security?

Patricia EggerI have two approaches that I usually recommend to people when they ask me that exact question. And it kinda depends on who it is and what their what their concerns are, what they're trying to achieve. And I think so the there's two ways to or at least two strategies that I think are good. One is to start with a product that you don't already use. So typically in the people around me, unfortunately, a lot of them don't use password managers.

Patricia EggerAnd so that's for me a good way to introduce them to, like, the Proton ecosystem or in general, these more kind of privacy security tools

Speaker 1that

Patricia Eggerare also extremely convenient. And if you're not already using a password manager, then, you know, you you start using one. You don't have to change from another product and then get used to it. And I preferred that UI or it was green and now it's blue and, you know, all that stuff. So that can be, I think, a good way to get introduced into it and then start using it.

Patricia EggerAnd then you hopefully see all of the benefits that come with using a password manager that are, you know, very user friendly. You don't the the benefits don't even necessarily have to be the security, but just, like, the user friendliness of the thing. And so that's, I think, a quite a good a good strategy. Another one that I've used multiple times, and I guess you could kind of do these in parallel, but is to to not go cold turkey when you're switching to something. So, like, typically with mail, what I've done with a few people is that I've set I've set them up with, like, a Proton email, and we didn't get rid of the old I think in most cases it was Gmail or Hotmail or whatever, the other one.

Patricia EggerYou keep them going in parallel. We have a tool that's easy switch, so you can import the entire inbox, your old, or say the Gmail to make things easier. You import that into your ProtonMail. And so you have all of the history of your previous emails. You didn't lose anything.

Patricia EggerAnd then you can also set up forwarding rules. So every email that comes into your Gmail gets forwarded to your, to your new one. And keep that going for however much time it takes you to get used to the new setup. And it can be, you know, a week if you're if you're fast, it can be two months if you're slower. It doesn't really matter because you still have that peace of mind that you haven't completely switched.

Patricia EggerAnd, like, if if you decide for whatever reason that it's not for you, you still you know, nothing has changed. You can keep using what you were used to. And I think that, like, just bringing the the the level of stress down is is helpful to to be like, just give it a try. You're not losing anything. It takes Maybe.

Patricia EggerHalf an hour to set all of this up, and then just keep it going in parallel, and then and then you'll see. And so those are strategies that work quite well.

Amelia HrubyYeah. I really appreciate those. So adding in a new tool that's just more convenient in general, like a password manager, I would agree. It's so helpful. And then also not taking an all or nothing approach.

Amelia HrubyIt's not that you have to, you know, start a ProtonMail account and then delete your Gmail that same day. Like, there is no binding contract that says you have to do that. And in fact, I still have my old Gmail account because there's, like, a family group email that no matter how many times I doth protest, they cannot update my email on it. And so it's the only thing that lands in that Gmail account, and I'm not stressed about it. Right?

Amelia HrubySo I think there's more space for, like, multiplicity and possibility as we continue working on our privacy online.

Patricia EggerAnd something I feel quite strongly about as well is, as you said, it's not all or nothing. You don't need to use all of Proton's products. Like, focus on the things that are the most important to you for whatever reason. And if that's your email, then you start with your email. And then if you think it's great, then you move on to, you know, docs or, you know, drive, whatever.

Patricia EggerYou don't need to like, having a bit of protection is still better than none at all. And so I think I feel like people sometimes are like, oh, well, what's the point? Because my something else is still in the big tech ecosystem. So, like, why bother? Why put an effort?

Patricia EggerAnd I I think that's not the right mindset to be in because then you're never gonna do anything. So baby steps, fine, you know, piece by piece, take the time you need to take. And honestly, like, for certain things, maybe it doesn't matter. And then you're happy to, you know, keep certain things in clear text where, you know, whoever can can read it and see it and and whatever. If that's okay for you, then that's okay.

Amelia HrubyTaking small, manageable steps is always the path I wanna recommend. And when people will say to me, like, well, Google knows everything, so I might as well just stay here. I'm like, they're really compelling reasons to not actually. Would you like to hear some of the reasons that even just not using Gmail or not using Google search could actually really benefit you? But off the grid listeners are definitely interested in those reasons and onboard with starting to make these shifts.

Amelia HrubyWe've already started talking about ProtonMail, and I told you earlier that I've been a user for over five years. I'm a big fan. I'm wondering if you could just break down for listeners, like, what makes ProtonMail different than other popular providers like Gmail or Outlook? I'm sure you have, like, a bullet list, but I would love to hear it from you and help listeners understand.

Patricia EggerThere's two points that I think are important for people to know the the main differences. They're linked, but to keep it simple. The first is that we do not have access to the contents of our users' emails. So we cannot go looking through them. We cannot monetize what's in there.

Patricia EggerWe're not gonna, you know, sell you ads based on emails that you've sent or whatever. If we get compromised, if someone, you know, is able to get into our servers, they will not be still not be able to read your emails. So, like, these leaks that you see happen regularly, this is not something that can happen to us. I think that's the main point. And the reason that this works is the second point is that our business model is not based on ads.

Patricia EggerIt's based on users paying for the subscription to the service. That's how we make money. We do not need to sell you ads. We cannot sell you ads, but because we cannot monetize your data, we need to get money elsewhere, and that's basically just users paying for the service.

Amelia HrubyI have this strange experience when I talk to people about email, and they will both be like, yeah, of course, there are ads in my email inbox. And also they'll

Amelia Hrubybe like, wait, that means they're reading my emails?

Amelia HrubyAnd I'm like, well, these things are connected, actually.

Patricia EggerIndeed they are.

Amelia HrubyIf the email is free, they're making money somewhere, and often it is through monetizing the content of what you're doing in your emails. And it has become this very quickly normalized practice that once I realized, like, wait, maybe this isn't so normal or it doesn't have to be the case. My email communication can be private to me. That's when I went looking for other options.

Patricia EggerIt is funny how that notion that if the thing is free, then, like, where is the money coming from? I would have thought that we had already covered that a few years ago, but it's still something that not everybody thinks that way, that, you know, it's kind of assumed to be normal that email is free. And when you think about it, you're like, well, then who's paying for all of the the servers, the people who are working on it, the maintenance, all that stuff? Like, it's not free. It can't be free.

Amelia HrubyYeah. Exactly. I've recently made the same switch with, like, search engines. Like, what makes search engines free? Well, at this stage, like, to me, the degradation of the results, but the ads, the selling of the ads, the AI overviews, etcetera.

Amelia HrubyAnd I've started paying for search this year, and it's been such a difference. Like, once all of the ads were pulled out, I was like, wow. Getting information when I search, what a novel concept. Kind of stuff. Yeah.

Amelia HrubyYeah. I have a very basic question that I think also has the complicated answer. So I would just love if you could try to break it down for me, which is I don't fully understand what it means when Proton tells me my email is unencrypted. And then people tell me that, like, an objection sometimes I'll get is, well, if you're emailing people with Gmail accounts, then that end's not encrypted, so it doesn't actually matter if your email's encrypted or not. So could you maybe kind of break that down or tell me, is that objection true?

Amelia HrubyDoes it matter? How should I think about it?

Patricia EggerIt's kind of true. And I think that's all the more reason for people who care about this topic to get their, you know, friends and family and people that they work with on board as well. It's one of these things, like, you can think of it as kind of the herd immunity thing. Like, you you can't just protect yourself in isolation. That doesn't doesn't work.

Patricia EggerIt doesn't really make sense. What works is if, you know, groups of people protect themselves altogether. So, indeed, if you're in general, if you're emailing someone who's on Gmail or or another not encrypted service, then Google would be able to read your emails because the person on the receiving side is is using their service. Proton did set up a way that you could still password protect your emails. So you have an extra layer and so you can communicate with people outside of the Proton ecosystem with with the protection.

Patricia EggerIt's a little bit more, I mean, effort, but it it does work. But the best is indeed for both sides to be using Proton, in which case then really nobody else except those two people can read the contents of the email. So, yeah, it's, to come back to your question, it's an argument for me, it's an argument to get the other person to use Proton, not to not use Proton, if you see what I mean.

Amelia HrubyYeah. It doesn't make the attempts for privacy futile. It's just a broader argument for why more of us should perhaps care about this. Yeah.

Patricia EggerYeah. And this is also something that I I feel really strongly about it is people I mean, us as human beings tend to think about ourselves a lot, which, you know, fine. But I think when it comes to privacy, I would like more people to realize or understand that the decisions that they make, the things that they do or that they don't do, affect other people's privacy. And I think if you see it that way, it's also, I would hope, compelling argument to get people to change. Because changing something for yourself, maybe you're like, can't be bothered.

Patricia EggerLike, it's just me. I I don't care. But if you can understand that your decisions and our, like, your decision to use a certain email provider is affecting the privacy of everyone that you email, maybe then you're like, okay. Maybe then it's worth it. And and, again, within that scope of all the people that you email, maybe there are a few people who, you know, have reasons to be more concerned about their privacy.

Patricia EggerI mean, I think it's, you know, it's a human right, so everyone should be concerned, but some people have, you know, a little extra reason. You know, so again, it's a herd immunity thing. You're not doing it only for yourself. You're also doing it for everyone else. I wish people thought of it this way.

Amelia HrubyYeah. I'm so grateful for this analogy, and I couldn't agree more. I mean, I think, you know, at Off the Grid, we're very pro vaccine, very pro public health, so much so. I mean, this is still the most convincing argument for vaccination, right, is to protect all of us in addition to ourselves. Whether you are the most at risk or not by being vaccinated, everyone benefits.

Amelia HrubyWe all stay well and safe together. I also just keep thinking with the example of email, like, you know, in The US where I live, it is illegal to open other people's mail that goes through, like, the USPS post. But then with email, we just let, you know, if we're using some of these non privacy focused servers, we're just letting other people open our mail. It would be like if you just let a stranger come in and open all the mail that you get in your mailbox before you read it. And that would not only impact your privacy, but also the privacy of anyone who sends you mail.

Amelia HrubyMaybe you're still getting love letters, which, like, what a joy. I don't think anyone does anymore. But, like, you know, the person who wrote it to you, like, that's their privacy too. And now this random third party has seen it, and when it was m supposed to be just intended for you. And I really want to continue pushing back against this sort of, perhaps cynical or pessimistic, but also just overwhelmed perspective that, like, there's nothing that we can do.

Amelia HrubyThere are simple changes that we can make that do have profound effects on our digital privacy.

Patricia EggerYeah. 100%. I mean and I think the the analogy with the physical world is a really good one because that's something that people can really relate to. And it's like, yeah, if imagine you could only ever send postcards, but for everything, like your test your medical test results and your, I don't know, the mail from your lawyers, whatever. It's all on a postcard.

Patricia EggerNo one would think that's okay.

Amelia HrubyThere are reasons we desire privacy. There are reasons that is and should be a right.

Amelia HrubyHi, friends. Amelia here, interrupting this episode because I'm wondering, do you wish that you could quit feeling that icky, sticky misalignment of relying on companies that you know are harmful, like Facebook, Instagram, Google, or Amazon, and instead, you could step away from them and redesign your digital setup for a softer, surveillance free life and business? Do you wish it felt easy to make those shifts, instead of, like, you have to turn your entire life upside down to break up with your Gmail account? Do you wish that someone understood that it's really hard to break up with the tech that we're using, even when we know it's values misaligned, and that person could guide you through a series of mindset shifts, step by step processes, and curated tool swaps so that you can feel the deep relief of alignment. If you wish any of those things, I'm so happy to inform you that I have created a workshop for you.

Amelia HrubyIt's called Opt Out, Five Steps to Break Up with Big Tech Today, and it's my path to take you from totally sick of the algorithm and online surveillance to feeling the sweet relief of digital clarity. Opt Out includes a ninety minute class as well as a tech swap planning and progress worksheet, and I also have a curated list of tech tools and resources so that you don't have to do all the research to figure out what you might use next. I've provided a lot of suggestions all in one convenient place. So if you're ready to opt out, please head to the show notes to grab this workshop. It's only $49 USD, so it's super affordable and it will hold your hand as you make the changes that you're probably thinking you wanna make as you continue listening to this episode.

Amelia HrubyThank you so much as always for tuning in to Off the Grid and for purchasing workshops like this to support my work. Again, you can find Opt Out at offthegrid.fun/opt-out, which is also linked in the show notes. Now let's get back to my conversation with Patricia from Proton.

Amelia HrubyYou know, we've been talking a lot about email. And as a millennial, I got my first email account, like, sometime in college, I think. But now I have, like, a really young nephew who's, like, already encountering phones, you know, seeing the Internet. I just think that, like, kids are encountering digital technology, it feels like, essentially from birth. And I know that Proton just launched this new initiative, Born Private.

Amelia HrubyCould you tell us about what that is, why it matters?

Patricia EggerBorn private. So this is a a really a call to action for parents to protect their kids online. So it's for $1 that goes to the Proton Foundation. You reserve an email account for your child that can stay locked for up to fifteen years. And so it stays, clean, empty, clear, encrypted.

Patricia EggerAnd when the kid is ready to use it, then they can they can go ahead and activate it. So that's that's what born private is. And as you said, like, nowadays, kids use digital stuff from very young ages. Proton did a a survey with over 1,200 US parents to see kind of what they how they felt about this, and and whether their kids were using, you know, email or social media devices and and all that stuff, and some really interesting data that came out of that. Like, for instance, 62% of the parents surveyed said that they would erase their child's digital footprint if they could.

Patricia EggerAnd I think that's that's pretty compelling. Like, you can you get a sense that parents have some regret that because this is their kids, that it's wasn't necessarily their decisions to have a digital footprint to begin with. And so I I see this as a you know, the parents feeling that if they had a second chance, they would do it differently. They they regret doing this. So, yeah, the these are these are pretty compelling numbers.

Patricia EggerForty four percent of children already have an email address, as you said. Like, it's it's not not just adults anymore. And most of those, if you have seventy six percent use Gmail. So from, you know, age of when you're clearly not able to you know, you're not legally allowed to make a lot of decisions as a child, but somehow you can give up on your privacy, which is kinda concerning.

Amelia HrubyAnd just the way that we know so many of these tech tools paid for by advertisers build profiles on users. And I was encountering this on social media in my twenties, and I was so impacted by the behavioral manipulation of the algorithm and being pushed toward things. I can't imagine experiencing that when I was 10 or 15 or 19 even. Okay. So you said parents can reserve email addresses for a dollar, and they can keep them locked for up to fifteen years.

Amelia HrubySo do they get to choose how long, or can you just log in at any point? How does that piece work?

Patricia EggerYeah. You can activate it anytime for up to fifteen years. So if you're because if your kid might already be 10 years old or eight or whatever. So you don't need to wait fifteen years, but you can if your child is born, like, now, they can wait until they're 15 in order to, to get it set up.

Amelia HrubyWell, I'm curious how how you're thinking then about digital identity beyond email. You know, Proton does more than just email. What are some of the other ways, you know, not just in the case of minors, but also in the case of adults, like tools that Proton's wrapping in to help us protect our, you know, online footprint.

Patricia EggerProton, I'm hoping I think a lot of us hope that at some point we'll have the full digital ecosystem. And we're working towards that already, and there's a number of of products that already exist. So email was the first, as you mentioned, then VPN came. I don't remember the order, so I'm gonna say it's in no particular order.

Speaker 1Yeah.

Patricia EggerThere's a calendar. We have drive, so storage, you know, file storage in the cloud. We have Proton Docs, so the kind of equivalent of of Google Docs, but again, encrypted. We have Sheets. There's a wallet.

Patricia EggerThere's the password manager, which is, I think, one of the best products that we have. And yeah. So those are those are the ones that are currently launched, and there's a few in the making that that'll hopefully be released pretty soon. But so, yeah, the the hope is to really have no more excuses. Like, everything that you need in your online life can be done, using encrypted tools.

Patricia EggerYou do not need any of the clear text stuff.

Amelia HrubyI'm really excited about this, and I've loved watching all the tools launch because as someone who helps people, you know, choose different tech, change platforms, etcetera, like, a common objection I get is, like, well, I do everything in Google, or I do everything with Microsoft. And I think that the, like, all in one nature of these tools and companies becomes the one of the biggest barriers to changing, because it feels like you have to literally overhaul your whole online life to make a shift. And we already talked before about why that's not true, like, how you can, you know, change one thing at a time, explore just the solutions that make sense for you. But I just think that, like, an all in one solution is really compelling for people.

Patricia EggerYeah. Absolutely. Like, and we we wanna get there. And that's that's also one of the the reasons why I think the taking that angle from kids is an important one because you see now children use Google for, like, at school and and then they get used to it. And then then that's what they like because they know how to use it, etcetera, etcetera.

Patricia EggerAnd so that's also, you know, you need to break that cycle. Right? Because also and whether it's in the professional world, I mean, you know, at at work, if you've always used, I don't know, Microsoft for your entire career, you'll just get you you're used to it. That's you know it. And so when maybe you go out to your next place and you get to choose, you'll be like, oh, I'm just gonna take Microsoft because I'm used to it.

Patricia EggerAnd so getting, like, the the the next generation to, you know, be acquainted with a different set of tools, I think, is also really important if you want to have actual, like, real impact when those people grow up and become adults.

Amelia HrubyYeah. I think that's such a good point. I feel like it was a few years ago that I started reading critical analysis on, like, why Google was donating Chromebooks to so many school districts. And in my mind, I'm like, how generous. And the people were like, no.

Amelia HrubyGoogle wants you to think it's generous, but what they're doing is training people into the Google ecosystem from elementary school on. And, again, it's like, that hadn't occurred to me until it sort of becomes clear, like, how entrenched we get in different technologies. I also think about, you know, in The US, when we talk about so many different technologies, but, like, with a lot of with government contractors, there's this sort of saying that, like, nobody gets fired for buying IBM, and they just, like, continue to do it over and over and over again because these solutions become sort of, like, reified as the obvious choice. And then our job is to you know, my job as a tech podcaster is to help people see, like, it doesn't have to be the obvious choice, and there's a lot more at stake here than you might realize. And now with Proton and others, we, like, finally have tools that we can turn to instead, especially for, again, like, nontechnical audiences, because I have definitely tried to stretch my abilities and, you know, like, install an instance of a private search engine on my computer, but it it's just beyond kind of what I am easily capable of for sure.

Amelia HrubyYeah.

Patricia EggerAnd I mean, then you it might work at first, and then you need to make an update and nothing works anymore. And it's for like, that's why the the whole privacy by default thing is is is really important. And and that's one of the things that I really like about Proton. I like, I was thinking back to kind of my journey with Proton and I was a I was a paid user, but many years before becoming an employee, so I've I feel like I contributed. And one of the one of the things that I remember and one of the reasons why I I was drawn to Proton myself was I was doing an internship so many, many years ago.

Patricia EggerAnd I was talking with one of the other people from my office. I don't know what about but, apparently, it was important because he he wanted to send me some data or some documents. And so he said, oh, yeah. Send me your send me your PGP key, and I'll send you the files, like, encrypted. And I was like, I don't know what that means.

Patricia EggerI'm like, okay. Here we go. Got back to my desk, and I was like, what does this mean? How do I do it? How do I set it up?

Patricia EggerLike, why is this so difficult? Why do I feel so stupid? And I think I managed, but I I it sucked. Like, ex user experience wise was not fun. And then when I when I discovered Proton, I was like, oh, they do this all for you, and this is great.

Patricia EggerYou don't need to feel like an idiot or you don't need to know and spend, you know, I don't know how many hours researching this. You just it just works. And that's that's beautiful.

Amelia HrubyYeah. Such a relief. I don't have to search Reddit threads forever where people just make me feel like an idiot. Yeah. It is nice just to have such a such an easy tool and a tool that also I can, like, not just use myself, but set up my parents in too.

Amelia HrubyRight? I I feel like it is accessible for generations. We've already talked about kids, but also folks who just don't feel as tech savvy. If you can use any of the other popular tools out there, you can use Proton. I feel like I'm just obviously gushing about your company and your services, and I wanna be clear that, like, this is not SponCon.

Amelia HrubyI don't have a formal relationship with Proton. I'm just excited about these tools. To wrap up, I wanted to ask you a little bit about AI, particularly Proton's tool, Lumo. So I would love to hear about Lumo first, and then maybe just talk a little bit about AI and privacy from there. So what is Lumo, and what makes it different than other AI tools?

Patricia EggerSo, yeah, Lumo is Proton's AI assistant chatbot. So just like you could talk to or chat GPT or Claude, whatever, whatever your preferred chatbot is, you could instead talk to Lumo. So this is our our AI. Main difference again being that we're not spying on our on our users. We don't we don't use the data for training or then to sell you stuff.

Patricia EggerIt's, it's really just supposed to be helpful. And again, you, you pay for it. So that's the, I mean, yeah, there's probably a free version as well, but the business model is users pay for it, and so we don't need to monetize their data. So that's that's the main difference. The the queries so the prompts, sorry, the things that you ask it, we do not see them.

Patricia EggerWe do not keep them. We don't do anything with them. So just, yeah, think of having, like, a a private conversation, basically.

Amelia HrubyAnd then I'm just curious, like, knowing that the things that we discuss and share through Lumo are private, where does the training data come from then? Because with other tools, like, privacy's been a major issue with that too. Right? Or some of the companies that own those tools have illegally scraped parts of the Internet to train them. And I'm just curious, like, if you can share, like, what has Proton's approach to building an AI tool been like on the level of privacy?

Patricia EggerI don't know all of the details, if I'm honest. But, generally, Proton is built on a lot of open source technology, and I believe that some of the models behind Lumo are open source. I think you can also, if not already the case, coming soon to be able to choose the model. And so different models were trained on different sets of data. And I think there was some that were created in Switzerland that were supposed to I mean, with the aim of having ethically trained models, so that are not stealing data, etcetera, etcetera.

Patricia EggerBut, yeah, I I would need to defer to the the folks at Lumo to give you more complete answer.

Amelia HrubyNo. That's already so helpful, though. I think that there's so much just, like, lack of knowledge, my own included, around models and different ones that are used in tools. And so much of what I see is just AI tools that are, you know, wrapped on top of OpenAI or ChatGPT. Right?

Amelia HrubyAnd so just even being clear, like, that's not what Lumo is. It's based on different models, models that are training on different data, considering different privacy dynamics. I think that's already helpful to know. And and this is another area where I'm trying to help people increase their knowledge and critical thinking skills around not all AI is the same. And there's a large base of off the grid listeners who don't wanna use AI at all, which I can understand, but I think for those who are using chatbots, it's not ChatGPT or Cloud or Bust.

Amelia HrubyThere are so many other models, so many other tools that are concerned with ethics and privacy and things. And so while I have you here as a head of security, you think about things like this all the time. Like, what are you seeing as sort of the future of privacy and security with AI changing the landscape of the Internet? And maybe particularly, like, for people who are using chatbots, what do you think they should be worried about or careful with when it comes to privacy and security?

Patricia EggerIf we're talking specific about AI chatbots and you're not sure whether you find them creepy or not, or maybe nothing happened that would make you find them creepy, you know, ask the one you use most often what it knows about you. And I'm pretty sure that then all of, you know, it'll become very creepy very quickly. There's been lots of people who've done this experiment. This is not something new that I'm inventing. Like, you you know, people have written articles about this as well.

Patricia EggerIt's like, wow. They know so much about me. It's really creepy. But I think that's something that, you know, the more people realize that if their entire lives are intertwined with AIs, like, they already know so much about you. The more you use them, the more they're gonna, like, create this profile about you, and probably the less comfortable you'll be with it.

Patricia EggerSo I'm I'm hoping that that's gonna become a realization. I would hope that we don't need to get to that point for people to consider alternatives, but I'm not sure that that's realistic because they are convenient and they are everywhere. And there's a lot of maybe not pressure, but there's a lot of hype of, like, you must be using it. You should be like, you can do all these great things with it. But, yeah, I I I think that sooner or later, there will be, you know, studies that come out and more scientific analysis of what the impact is.

Patricia EggerAnd there will be incidents where, you know, leak of this or that will be used against someone in really horrendous ways. Just, you know, like social media has even just very recently been, you know, shown to have very negative impact on some people. You know, AI is next. There's no reason that it that it's not gonna happen, and it may be worse. I don't know.

Patricia EggerOr at least it won't be better.

Amelia HrubyI feel like what I'm taking away from this is that many AI tools feel private because it feels like we're just talking to this one other thing on the end of it. But they're not concerned with your privacy as the user. Like, that is not what most of the models are concerned with. Now, of course, with something like Lumo, you do have a tool where that chat is encrypted and saying with you. But, yeah, I I just always try to run myself through a lens of, like, if I would not tell this to a random person at the grocery store, I'm not gonna tell it to the Internet.

Amelia HrubyYeah. And that applies to chatbots too.

Patricia EggerI'd say flat. It's it's crazy that you have to actively remind yourself of that because they are so convenient and they're so everywhere that it's easy to forget and to let yourself kind of just drift and then get to the point where you're like, oh, well, they already know everything about me. So here's my medical records and, like, tell me what's wrong with me. You know? Like, it shouldn't be this vicious cycle of it's it knows everything, so it might as well know more.

Amelia HrubyYeah. And this we can wrap where you sort of led us earlier to the hear herd immunity piece of, like, we all keep us private. We all keep us safe by also not telling chatbots things about other people. If you are trying to get support with a relationship dynamic, but you're telling the chatbot who this person is and their name, like, that's a lot of information that other person might not want you to share. And I think that there are a lot of, like, blurred lines around privacy, security, and even just, like, consent when it comes to AI tools.

Amelia HrubyI've had this come up in my own work, people, you know, uploading documentation I've made for them to AI or things that I didn't agree to that were then shared with models because for in their mind, they're like, well, this is just helping me. And in my mind, I'm like, that's infringing on my intellectual property. And I think that we need to be having more of these conversations. So I'm grateful for you sort of bringing that lens in too.

Patricia EggerTotally agree. I think, we need to think about those around us as well as ourselves.

Amelia HrubyCan you tell people where they can find all of the Proton services and choose the ones that they maybe wanna start using?

Patricia EggerYeah. For sure. So the the website is proton.me,me. And there, you'll find all of the different products. You'll also find the Born Private campaign under that, under mail.

Patricia EggerAnd so, yeah, you should find, all of the information. You can also know that all of the products also exist. They're free versions of them as well. So if you're not sure or if you don't have the means, you can also use the the free versions. There's a few less features, but, you know, you can still use them.

Amelia HrubyI love that. So, yes, folks, try things out. It can be free to start. If you love it, you can invest. If not, you can go back to your old tools if you so choose.

Amelia HrubyBut thank you so much, Patricia, for being here. Thanks to Proton for everything that you all do to protect our privacy and security online. And until next time, we will see everyone off the grid.

Speaker 1I kinda hate social media feeds on my brain like a bacteria. If you're in my Wikipedia, it'll say I kinda hate social media. Host a picture of myself. Sacrifices my mental help. Use your product time to tell.