Proton is often seen as a nonprofit, but in reality it operates as a private company, Proton AG, with the Proton Foundation as a majority shareholder. This structure is designed to protect its mission, but many users are not fully aware of how it works or what guarantees it provides long term.

Proton asks users to trust that its incentives will always stay aligned with privacy. While that may be true today, long term trust is harder to evaluate without some visibility into ownership and financial direction. For example, WhatsApp was once widely seen as privacy-focused, but shifts in ownership and business pressures changed how it operates over time. Proton is asking for a similar level of long-term trust, so additional transparency would help reinforce confidence.

Providing a small set of high level, non-sensitive statistics would go a long way in building confidence. Here are some key indicators that could meaningfully improve transparency:

• Voting control: What percentage of voting shares are held by the Proton Foundation vs private investors
• Board composition: How many seats in Proton AG’s Board of Directors are tied to the Foundation vs private owners
• Basic revenue breakdown: Subscriptions, donations, merch, etc (as percentages, since absolute figures may be sensitive)

These are not requests for detailed financial disclosures or anything that would harm competitiveness. They are simple, aggregated signals that help users understand whether Proton’s structure and incentives are likely to remain aligned with its stated values over time.

Proton already leads in transparency through reports and independent audits. Publishing a few governance and financial summary stats would complete that picture and make it much easier for users to place long term trust in the service.