Adding my support to the DO NOT DELETE voices.

Can't believe you'd delete accounts. Sure, it might be costly to keep old accounts, but I'd never want that old stuff deleted. If I have something I need, I email it to myself, and I have plenty of email accounts I haven't opened in years, which I still use on a daily basis as forwarding accounts, etc.

DO NOT DELETE ACCOUNTS. Please. Thanks! :)

Unless something changed this year, Tutanota delete accounts too, after 6 months of inactivity.

While I don't think that deletion of inactive accounts is necessarily a bad thing, it helps to keep clutter away, especially the spam accounts, there should be a more clear definition of when the account gets deleted. Three or more months of inactivity seems like someone is going on a whim if to delete an account or not, instead of it being a strict rule.

If deletion is the way to go, maybe extending it to 1 year would be better, as most likely people will be able to get internet access within that time somehow, even though three months in today's world is a long time as well.

A better way would probably be to simply de-activate an account by making the user verify that their account is still theirs after a long inactivity period.

It could be verified through personal data or a secondary e-mail account that should be set up and verified in the settings.

A notification e-mail maybe would also be nice to let the user know that their account is about to be de-activated.

According to https://www.bookwritingbureau.co.uk/publishing/, It's a simple way to keep Google from canceling your account. Simply use Gmail, Google Drive, or Google Photos on the browser or on your mobile device when logged into your account and connected to the internet.

Strange. The comment didn't go through. I'll try again.

Over 1126 votes already. The management of the company simply doesn't care. They just don't care about their users. Go to hell, you moron who invented account deletion! You don't belong at Proton! I've never seen such a fucked up idea anywhere else. Dear developers, please fuck this bastard once and then kick him out of the company. Deleting accounts will do NOTHING good. And your greed will only lead to more hetjy! You just read that thread already. Fucking morons!

There are already over 1,126 votes. The company management simply doesn't care. They just don't care about their users. Go to hell, you moron who invented account deletion! You don't belong at Proton! I've never seen such a fucked up idea anywhere else. Dear developers, please fuck this bastard once and then kick him out of the company. Deleting accounts will do NOTHING good. And your greed will only lead to more hetjy! You just read that thread already. Fucking morons!

Shut the fuck up Geoff Jones, you're probably a ProtonMail employee trying to make this feature look good! It's a terrible fucking idea... Gmail doesn't delete their customers account, because they know it doesn't make fucking sense. The idea of deleting user's account is absolutely trash. I wish I could punch in the fucking face the retard that came up with this idea!!!

I can understand why Proton want to do this. There are probably thousands of defunct accounts on their servers that have been dormant for years, that are just consuming storage space. I say this because - due to the level of anonymity provided by a ProtonMail account, and the ease of creating a new account - it's highly likely that:

1) many people have created a "throw-away" account for a particular purpose and once fulfilled, they abandon the account, maybe without even clearing it of emails first.

2) many people have created accounts, then forgotten their password, and have no recovery methods configured, so have no way to access their accounts, so have to abandon them and create a new account.

I have actually been guilty of both of those charges - when I first heard about ProtonMail, I created an account that was only ever intended to be a repository for receiving mail in connection with a particular website/app that has a reputation for spamming its customers by default with promotional and subscription-based email, so wanted to avoid junking up my main email account. This Proton account also served as a receptacle for the "verify to activate your account" email from the aforementioned website. I created the Proton account quickly, midway through registering with the website, so skipped all the 2FA / recovery options. I then tried to log into the account a few days later and was told that the password was incorrect, even though I was sure that I'd memorised it and entered it correctly. With no way to recover the password, I had to abandon the account, which by now is probably full of hundreds of marketing mails from the website, and maybe still receiving more on a daily basis.
Later, I created another account that I intended to use for Steam account management, and again (stupidly) didn't set up any recovery option. Thankfully I hadn't actually bought any games from Steam at that point, as when I tried to log into this ProtonMail account - having manually copied my password into Kaspersky Password Manager during registration - I was told again that the password was invalid.

For my third attempt at setting up a ProtonMail account - the one I'm currently using - I decided to do things properly, as I wanted to migrate from Gmail to PM. o during the registration process, I not only added the credentials to KPM, but also created 2FA / account recovery options and also created recovery files/phrases for it which are saved to my computer. I have been using this account successfully for about six months now.

Back to the point of this reply, I hope that I have been able to demonstrate why Proton want to purge dead accounts from their servers, thereby freeing up huge amounts of storage space, as well as (depending on their security policies) freeing up usernames/email addresses to be reallocated to new members. To just hang on to every account ever created, no matter how long its been since it was last accessed by the account holder, would be massively inefficient, in terms of storage space/costs, maintenance and security.

I do understand the points you raise about people being unable to access their accounts for extended periods of time due to unforeseen illness or global/political crises, so here's what I would suggest:

1) For all ProtonMail accounts that have lain dormant (not been successfully logged into for more than 12 months), Proton need to send out an email to all email addresses associated with the account, warning that the account will be deactivated within seven days unless the account is logged into again, and as such will be unable to receive incoming mails. However, it will be left available so that, if someone then logs into an account that is marked as dormant, it reactivates it immediately and makes it a live account as if it had never been made dormant.

2) After 18 months, Proton need to send out another email to all email addresses associated with the dormant account, warning that, if the account isn't reactivated within another six months, it will be permanently deleted, including all associated data - emails, calendar appointments, etc.

3) Seven days before the 2-year final deadline, one final warning should be sent to the account and all associated email addresses stating that, if not re-activated via successful logon within seven days, the account and all data will be permanently and irretrievably deleted from all Proton servers.

4) After that seven-day period is complete, the account - if not accessed by the owner - is then deleted permanently, freeing up server space.

5) Depending on GDPR / other data security laws, the deleted account username is then 'released' so for instance deleted account "John.Smith@protonmail.com" then becomes available for a new person called John Smith who is signing up to ProtonMail to be able to use. For data security/privacy reasons, the lead time on releasing usernames may be between 5-10 years.

I'm not sure 100% what the timeframe was, but I was a customer with another service. My services got disrupted and I came back to said service with no account, and I'm going to keep in mind that ProtonMail also does this. However, I have to disagree with Jo, as TutaNota was the service that axed my email account. I'd finally gotten free of Google and wanted to set up with service providers that DON'T use Google or enable their bad business practices. If I wanted Google, I'd have stuck with GMail, wouldn't I..?

Should Protonmail be required to keep a record of your user account and password in perpetuity? I would think that Protonmail would be required to delete your information after a certain period of time, but I live in the USA.

I do think the cleaning idea is excellent. Just save our email address and password. Unfortunately, this will make all usernames longer over time. That would mean Protonmail would have to store a very large number of usernames. The usernames would become so long and complex very few people would want one.

Please, don't delete inactive accounts!

Please do not use violent words!
I agree with this point of view, clear data is enough, account should not be deleted (extended to at least two years).

It is really stupid. And nobody cares. One thousand humans agree. Nobody cares again.

Please, don't delete accounts. A lot of your users with accounts linked as recovery/two-factor e-mail will be left completely locked out. Wipe content or allow re-activation instead.

Totally agree. Do not delete our accounts!

I think must be deleted after of 2 years since log out.

Before - if at all - deleting an inactive account, try to - is that technically possibe? - reach the recovery email. Remove the content, for example, but do not delete.

Before - if at all - deleting an inactive account, try to - is that technically possibe? - reach the recovery email. Set it to the free plan, for example, but do not delete.

I think we should solve it in other ways. They shouldn’t delete anything, but it is really not nice. I am disappointed in Proton.

I am really sorry but will we have official comments?! It is fucking 580 votes!