Sorry, just to check: your evidence is "I think I read it somewhere?". If it weren't for "weak argument, dismissed" being too "cringe" even for ME...

If you have evidence, please actually provide it. If you don't, please shut your opinion hole.

And

she was the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council Chair of the Future of Internet Security

That actually seems like a good background to have for working on software/products like this?

Also, people should actually LOOK at what proton "promises". Mostly it boils down to limited protections and suggested tools to protect yourself. Which is why, as a company, I like them. They aren't promising to fight all the governments of the world. In fact, they are pretty open that they are gonna roll over because they don't know you. But what they do claim to turn over? Combine that with some opsec and personal encryption and you are in a really "good" place for someone who has a warrant out on them.

Contrast that with all the companies that DO make wild claims about having zero data and being willing to go to nu-gitmo for their customers and blah blah blah.

The reality is: if you are doing something the CIA should care about, you... probably shouldn't be doing email at all. That said, there are ways to reduce your risk factor and they almost all boil down to communicating with trusted and vetted individuals where you can actually encrypt communications yourself rather than relying on a company to do so.

But if you are mostly just pirating shit or writing graphic lemons about threesomes involving trump, xinnie, and putin? Meh. You can do a lot worse.

Ah. Thank you for actually finally citing yourself.

I actually HAD seen that before so:

1. .Protonmail Behaves like a CIA/NSA “Honeypot”: This is an incredibly sensationalized point that boils down to them having a really shit TOR page. And, agreed. But "In fact, the only other websites that operate like this are suspected NSA/CIA Honeypots." is very much false. LOTS of sites are configured in a really shitty manner which gets back to people having to understand the tools they use.
2. Protonmail Does Not Provide “End to End Encryption”: Yeah. Which gets back to what I have been saying the entire time. If you actually care about your security, encrypt your own emails. Nobody should EVER trust a company to do encryption for them when it actually matters. Which speaks to the quality of proton as a service, not it being a "honeypot"
3. . Protonmail’s Was Created Under CIA/NSA Oversight: That article is almost entirely them just repeating that same inflammatory statement over and over. But it boils down to having issues with something coming out of MIT research which is a prestigious school with government grants and very questionable side hustles for some professors. The reality is that almost all software is at least "incubated" under very questionable circumstances because... people gotta eat and the people doing the kind of research that makes "cool stuff" tend to get government grants (well, not as of two weeks ago but...)
4. .Protonmail is Part Owned by CRV and the Swiss Government: Which is not the CIA?
5. CRV, In-Q-Tel & the CIA : I am not seeing a direct link to Proton Corp other than "Additionally, The mastermind, cryptographer & back end developer that created Protonmail, Wei Sun, now works for Google.". Which... okay? If it was written properly that doesn't matter. If it wasn't then.. encrypt your own emails.
6. Protonmail Follows CIA Email format & Metadata Requirements: "There are several ways to store emails, and Protonmail has selected the format that the CIA requires. ". Yup. Smoking gun right there. They chose the wrong standard. Yes, I would like it if they encrypted that metadata on principle. But it doesn't matter. If they are compromised, they have that metadata anyway. Again, encrypt your own communications and maybe don't use your personal accounts when you are discussing super sensitive topics?
7. . Swiss MLAT Law Could Give the NSA Full Access: Are we back to the Swiss being a CIA front?
8. Protonmail Uses Radware for DNS/DDOS Protection: So now it is Mossad who controls Proton and all they have to do is compromise a DDOS filter. Again, encrypt your emails.
9. Protonmail Developers Do Not Use Protonmail: if not wanting to eat your own dogfood means you are a CIA operation then Uncle Sam owes me a lot of money.
10. Protonmail engages in illegal cyberwarfare: They did a "hack back", Okay? Fuck 'em, but okay?
11. Protonmail has a history of Dishonesty: Yeah, there is no bias in that list at all

You see, when you actually post a link to stuff people can discuss what you are talking about and explain why you are misinformed and clearly referencing a somewhat deranged hit piece.

The main takeaway from that? They are, at worst, as bad as gmail. Except with a much smaller customer base and at least more open that they want you to pay for functionality rather than not question what google is doing with your data.

And, as proton themselves even say: if it actually matters, encrypt your own emails. That way Proton Corp don't have anything they can give to their CIA/Mossad/Swiss overlords.

you want me as an ally, your tone lost me…

If the only way you care about people protecting their privacy and very selfs is if someone is nice to you and cuddles you and thanks you for spewing uncited nonsense...