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Not the US fifth amendment, no. (Edit: it does apply in cases where they are dealing within the US with officials at any level of US government, or when making statements to US officials who are conducting a custodial interrogation abroad.)

They are based in a country with more than five amendments to its current federal constitution, but since they are unlikely to want to construct a minaret, the prohibition on doing so in the current Swiss federal constitution’s fifth amendment doesn’t affect them in any meaningful way.




They have servers in the US though which I assume means they operate some kind of business identity over there.


Yeah, in contexts which are sufficiently US-linked those protections may apply - I’ve edited my comment. Mostly not though.

Anyway, even in the US, providing a decryption key would only be protection by the fifth amendment if testimony by a human is involved - not simply, for example, turning over a USB key or even a piece of paper on which the key is printed So this question is mostly moot for the scenario we are discussing, except if information in a human mind is needed to access the key.


> Not the US fifth amendment, no. They are based in a country...

Do we really assume not being in the US directly fixes everything?

When...

- Most social media used is US-based

- Phone markets like Android and iOS are US-based

- Browser stores like Chrome are US-based

- They have US-based servers

- They have US-based customers

- They have customers specifically wanting to access US-based content

The list goes on...

And they even have a .com domain, which is US-based.


> Do we really assume not being in the US directly fixes everything?

Nobody said anything about fixing everything. When the US fifth amendment doesn’t apply, people have fewer protections from the US government, not more.

Also, I should correct myself slightly on when the US fifth amendment applies: in the rare case where US officials do conduct a custodial interrogation abroad, US courts will recognize the US fifth amendment protection against self-incrimination for statements made to those US officials in that context, even for statements made by foreign nationals. But US courts will not recognize those rights for statements made to foreign officials, outside of two rarely applicable exceptions. Also, of course, dealings within the US with US government officials are constitutionally protected for all nationalities.

I’ve edited my comment upthread accordingly.

With respect to Proton’s home government of Switzerland, they might have more protections or fewer protections than the US fifth amendment offers versus the US government when it does apply - I have no idea and avoided making any assertion either way about that.




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