@404.media: You might think of Proton as a company that really cares about your privacy and security. Turns out, according to sources within the company who spoke to 404 Media's Joseph Cox, that Proton's CEO Andy Yen is calling the company's employees "losers" for things like cautioning him to pentest an AI-coded project before going live and even setting up an email account for employees to use to report anything getting in their way of using AI. As the internal documents, audio leaks and even an AI-generated manifesto from the company read, the future of Proton is not one of engineers working to keep your data safe, but one of project managers that oversee and use AI to keep the company running. 404 Media spoke to eight current and one former Proton employees and reviewed Slack chats, meeting recordings, and an AI manifesto written by the company’s CTO. Our reporting reveals a culture of fear inside Proton, where many employees are hesitant to even mildly critique Yen’s views or discuss engineering problems. Workers describe an environment where employees have genuine concerns about security or being asked to develop security products with AI, but feel unable to voice them, lest Yen berates them in front of everyone or threatens their employment at the company. One employee told 404 Media, “Whatever persona Andy [Yen] has out of Proton, he’s a straight up bully inside. He routinely breaks his little facade in Slack and calls people losers and stupid, often for stuff he’s paying them for.” Link in bio to read our investigation now.

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Thursday 29 October 2026 16:18:58 GMT