Proton's biased article on Deepseek
Article: https://proton.me/blog/deepseek
Calls it "Deepsneak", failing to make it clear that the reason people love Deepseek is that you can download and it run it securely on any of your own private devices or servers - unlike most of the competing SOTA AIs.
I can't speak for Proton, but the last couple weeks are showing some very clear biases coming out.
DeepSeek is open source, meaning you can modify code(new window) on your own app to create an independent — and more secure — version. This has led some to hope that a more privacy-friendly version of DeepSeek could be developed. However, using DeepSeek in its current form — as it exists today, hosted in China — comes with serious risks for anyone concerned about their most sensitive, private information.
Any model trained or operated on DeepSeek’s servers is still subject to Chinese data laws, meaning that the Chinese government can demand access at any time.
What???? Whoever wrote this sounds like he has 0 understanding of how it works. There is no "more privacy-friendly version" that could be developed, the models are already out and you can run the entire model 100% locally. That's as privacy-friendly as it gets.
"Any model trained or operated on DeepSeek's servers are still subject to Chinese data laws"
Operated, yes. Trained, no. The model is MIT licensed, China has nothing on you when you run it yourself. I expect better from a company whose whole business is on privacy.
To be fair, most people can't actually self-host Deepseek, but there already are other providers offering API access to it.
I think they mean privacy friendly version of the infrastructure could be developed.
What???? Whoever wrote this sounds like he has 0 understanding of how it works. There is no "more privacy-friendly version" that could be developed, the models are already out and you can run the entire model 100% locally. That's as privacy-friendly as it gets.
Unfortunately it is you who have 0 understanding of it. Read my comment below. Tldr: good luck to have the hardware
I understand it well. It's still relevant to mention that you can run the distilled models on consumer hardware if you really care about privacy. 8GB+ VRAM isn't crazy, especially if you have a ton of unified memory on macbooks or some Windows laptops releasing this year that have 64+GB unified memory. There are also websites re-hosting various versions of Deepseek like Huggingface hosting the 32B model which is good enough for most people.
Instead, the article is written like there is literally no way to use Deepseek privately, which is literally wrong.
Is it Open Source? I cannot find the source code. The official repository https://github.com/deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-R1 only contains images, a PDF file, and links to download the model. But I don't see any code. What exactly is Open Source here?
Obviously you need lots of GPUs to run large deep learning models. I don't see how that's a fault of the developers and researchers, it's just a fact of this technology.
Down votes be damned, you are right to call out the parent they clearly dont articulate their point in a way that confirms they actually understand what is going on and how an open source model can still have privacy implications if the masses use the company's hosted version.
There are already other providers like Deepinfra offering DeepSeek. So while the the average person (like me) couldn't run it themselves, they do have alternative options.
How apt, just yesterday I put together an evidenced summary of the CEOs recent absurd comments. Why are Proton so keen to throw away so much good will people had invested in them?!
This is what the CEO posting as u/Proton_Team stated in a response on r/ProtonMail:
Here is our official response, also available on the Mastodon post in the screenshot:
Corporate capture of Dems is real. In 2022, we campaigned extensively in the US for anti-trust legislation.
Two bills were ready, with bipartisan support. Chuck Schumer (who coincidently has two daughters working as big tech lobbyists) refused to bring the bills for a vote.
At a 2024 event covering antitrust remedies, out of all the invited senators, just a single one showed up - JD Vance.
By working on the front lines of many policy issues, we have seen the shift between Dems and Republicans over the past decade first hand.
Dems had a choice between the progressive wing (Bernie Sanders, etc), versus corporate Dems, but in the end money won and constituents lost.
Until corporate Dems are thrown out, the reality is that Republicans remain more likely to tackle Big Tech abuses.
Source: https://archive.ph/quYyb
To call out the important bits:
That was posted in ther/ProtonMail sub where the majority of the event took place: https://old.reddit.com/r/ProtonMail/comments/1i1zjgn/so_that_happened/m7ahrlm/
However be aware that the CEO posting as u/Proton_Team kept editing his comments so I wouldn't trust the current state of it. Plus the proton team/subreddit mods deleted a ton of discussion they didn't like. Therefore this archive link captured the day after might show more but not all: https://web.archive.org/web/20250116060727/https://old.reddit.com/r/ProtonMail/comments/1i1zjgn/so_that_happened/m7ahrlm/
Some statements were made on Mastodon but these are subsequently deleted, but they're capture by an archive link: https://web.archive.org/web/20250115165213/https://mastodon.social/@protonprivacy/113833073219145503
I learned about it from an r/privacy thread but true to their reputation the mods there also went on a deletion spree and removed the entire post: https://www.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/1i210jg/protonmail_supporting_the_party_that_killed/
This archive link might show more but I've not checked: https://web.archive.org/web/20250115193443/https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/1i210jg/protonmail_supporting_the_party_that_killed/
There's also this lemmy discussion from the day after but by that point the Proton team had fully kicked in their censorship so I don't know how much people were aware of (apologies I don't know how to make a generic lemmy link) https://feddit.uk/post/22741653
Until corporate Dems are thrown out, the reality is that Republicans remain more likely to tackle Big Tech abuses.
What a fucking dumbass. Yes, dems suck. But at least Lina Khan was head of the FTC and starting to change how antitrust laws are enforced. Did he delete this post after Trump was inaugurated with 3 of the richest tech billionaires?
Lisa Khan is a hero. This is quite twisted "logic": this party sucks, so let's side with Hitler instead.
People got flack for saying Proton is the CIA, Proton is NSA, Proton is a joint five-eyes country intelligence operation despite the convenient timing of their formation and lots of other things.
Maybe they're not, maybe their CEO is just acting this way.
But consider for a moment if they were. IF they were then all of this would make more sense. The CIA/NSA/etc have a vested interest in discrediting and attacking Chinese technology they have no ability to spy or gather data through. The CIA/NSA could also for example see a point to throwing in publicly with Trump as part of a larger agreed upon push with the tech companies towards reactionary politics, towards what many call fascism or fascism-ish.
My mind is not made up. It's kind of unknowable. I think they're suspicious enough to be wary of trusting them but there's no smoking gun, yet there wasn't a smoking gun that CryptoAG was a CIA cut-out until some unauthorized leaks nearly a half century after they gained control and use of it. We know they have an interest in subverting encryption, in going fishing among "interesting" targets who might seek to use privacy-conscious services and among dissidents outside the west they may wish to vet and recruit.
True privacy advocates should not be throwing in with the agenda of any regime or bloc, especially those who so trample human and privacy rights as that of the US and co. They should be roundly suspicious of all power.
In other words, honeypot. And an US plant in Switzerland...
OpenAI, Google, and Meta, for example, can push back against most excessive government demands.
Sure they "can" but do they?
Why do that when you can just score a deal with the government to give them whatever information they want for sweet perks like foreign competitors getting banned?
“Pushing back against the government” doesn’t even make sense. These people are oligarchs. They largely are the government. Who attended Trump’s inauguration? Who hosted Trump’s inauguration party? These US tech oligarchs.
They cannot. When big daddy FBI knocks on the door and you get that forced NDA you, will build in backdoors and comply with anything the US government tells you.
Even then the US might want to you to shut down because they want to control your company.
TikTok.
1978 US Automotive Companies: If we make a product that locks our customers in, they'll be our customers forever!
1978 Japanese Automotive Companies: The US gave us their required parameters. If we make a product that works then customers will keep buying our stuff.
2025 US Tech Companies: If we make our products contingent on proprietary software and hardware, we'll lock them in.
2025 Chinese Tech Companies: The US gave us their required parameters. If we make a product that works and they can utilize freely, they'll keep buying our stuff.
Not our first rodeo.
It’s simple:
bad.Well you just made me choke on my laughter. Well done, well done.
🤣
Since ditching Proton for Tuta and Mailbox...I haven't missed anything and I'm saving money.
I got a proton vpn subscription a while ago and they upgraded me to unlimited for the same price. So I think I'm paying like $6.25/month for an unlimited plan. I feel like it's too good to leave. If I do tuta's plan that's $3, then another $4 for simplelogin, and $5 for mullvad. So that's $12 a month if I leave my plan.
I get it, and please, you do you. There's no issue.
I'd just add that I can save money using Amazon, but I try to avoid it when I can. I'll pay a little extra when I can, for the greater good.
You have two email addresses in both Tuta and Mailbox? Any particular reason for that, that you could share with us? 🙏
To be fair its correct but it's poor writing to skip the self hosted component. These articles target the company not the model.
Goddammit I had such high hopes for Proton. Was planning on that being my post-Google main. Now what. 💀
At this point I'm this 🤏 close to hosting my own email abandoning it all an living in a cabin in yhe woods
Anything European-based to recommend? I'd like something as far-removed from America as possible, respecting GDPR, privacy, etc., but with a good-sized free-tier storage. I don't think I need more than a couple GB for email. Calendar included would be a big plus as well. 😅 Probably asking for a lot here...
I've been happy with Fastmail for 10 years, though they're Australian and not European. Might look into a European alternative at some point but so far I've had no reason to switch.
I've heard of Startmail being an alternative, it's based in the Netherlands but it's quite expensive ($7/month) and it's owned by an adtech company (System1)
How is this Open Source? The official repository https://github.com/deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-R1 contains images only, a PDF file, and links to download the model. I don't see any code. What exactly is Open Source here? And if so, where to get the source code?
Open-Source in AI usually posted to HuggingFace instead of GitHub: https://huggingface.co/deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-R1
In deep learning generally open source doesn't include actual training or inference code. Rather it means they publish the model weights and parameters (necessary to run it locally/on your own hardware) and publish academic papers explaining how the model was trained. I'm sure Stallman disagrees but from the standpoint of deep learning research DeepSeek definitely qualifies as an "open source model"
Just because they call it Open Source does not make it. DeepSeek is not Open Source, it only provides model weights and parameters, not any source code and training data. I still don't know whats in the model and we only get "binary" data, not any source code. This is not Libre software.
So "Open Source" to AI is just releasing a .psd file used to export a jpeg, and you need some other proprietary software like Photoshop in order to use it.
I suspect the enshittification of proton is fast approaching.
Im stuck. Is there a Guide for a fast approaching full suit switch?
Caleneder, Passwords, Email, Drive?
Email and calendar: Tuta, Posteo, Mailbox.org, Disroot
Passwords: Bitwarden, KeepassXC
Drive: Filen.io
@ReakDuck Well Nextcloud I guess but they only offer an email client so you can connect an existing email account
many services will not accept email addresses that are not Gmail or protonmail or outlook etc. I don't know what you would use
this is obviously talking about their web app, which most people will be using. In this special instance, it was clearly not the LLM itself censoring the Tiananmen Square, but a layer on top.
i have not bothered downloading and asking deepseek about Tiananmen Square. so i cannot know what the model would have generated. however, it is possible that certain biasses are trained into any model.
i am pretty sure, this blog is aimed at the average user. while i wouldn't trust any LLM company with my data, i certainly wouldn't want the chinese government to have them. anyone that knows how to use (ollama)[https://github.com/ollama/ollama] should know these telemetry data don't apply to running locally. but for sure, pointing it out in the blog would help.
@ToxicWaste @JOMusic the censorship is trained into the ollama models too. But of course the self-hosted model cannot send anything to China, so at least the whole tracking issue is avoided.
There are many llms you can use offline
Including DeepSeek: https://huggingface.co/deepseek-ai
Deepseek works reasonably well, even at cpu only in ollama. I ran the 7b and 1.5b models and it wasn't awful. 7b slowed down as the convo went on, but the 1.5b model felt pretty passable while I was playing with it
Jesus fuckin Christ, just marry Trump at this point, Mister proton CEO.
I think maybe Multihop is the Mullvad equivalent?
I want to preface this question by saying that I'm not trolling and I'm not defending Proton. I'm genuinely confused at the reaction to this article.
I'm also upset with Proton's recent comments, specifically the December tweet and subsequent responses, and I'm evaluating my use of Proton.
Near as I can tell, this article (which I did read) lays out the facts about Deepseek as an LLM originating in China and the implications of that.
Why is this article a reason to pile on proton?
Proton had a reputation for being the good guy. In the span of a month, we saw them bend the knee, flip flop and throw shade at competition; all while pretending to be the hero. We essentially have to trust them with our data and they are showing signs that they are willing to act against that trust with worrisome agendas and biases. It's not a good look, and since this marketing to users key issues, it's going to cause some responses.
That's fair. I suppose people will have their pitchforks and will pile on anything at this point
Calls it "Deepsneak", failing to make it clear that the reason people love Deepseek is that you can download and it run it securely on any of your own private devices or servers - unlike most of the competing SOTA AIs.I can't speak for Proton, but the last couple weeks are showing some very clear biases coming out.
The reason a very small subset of users love it*
All the downloads making it the top app in the app stores are from people using their centralized service. The people behind these downloads have no clue that you can run it locally or can even start to understand what that would even mean. It is this usage the article is addressing.
Like the thread starter, I am also confused to why this in particular draws so much hate.
It might be that they're equating the name with the app and company, not the open source model, based on one of the first lines:
AI chat apps like ChatGPT collect user data, filter responses, and make content moderation decisions that are not always transparent.
Emphasis mine. The rest of the article reads the same way.
Most people aren't privacy-conscious enough to care who gets what data and who's building the binaries and web apps, so sounding the alarm is appropriate for people who barely know the difference between AI and AGI.
I get that people are mad at Proton right now (anyone have a link? I'm behind on the recent stuff), but we should ensure we get mad at things that are real, not invent imaginary ones based on contrived contexts.
Here is a general write up about the CEO showing their maga colors.
More happened in the reddit thread though that added some more elements, like the ceo opting for a new user name with "88" in it (a common right wing reference), his unprompted use of the phrase "didnt mean to trigger you," him evasively refusing to clarify what his stance actually was because "that would be more politics," on and on. You can read through that thread here, although proton corporate are mods, so i have no idea what they may have deleted at this point.
The thread was full of "mask on" behavior that is pretty transparent to anyone experienced with the alt right on the internet.
Yeah it's a fair call, but to me it is the very context of why people are made at Proton that makes me suspicious of articles like this.
I can't find the original summary post someone made, but here's the last response from Proton CEO. Read the comments as well to get a good summary: https://www.reddit.com/r/ProtonMail/comments/1i2nz9v/on_politics_and_proton_a_message_from_andy/
TL;DR: Proton used their official accounts to share CEO's pro-US-Republican thoughts as their official stance. They since apologized and said they would use personal account to share those thoughts. But (IMO) now having posted this blog on the actual Proton website, it says to me that there are some serious bias alignment issues with a company that is supposed to be a safe-haven away from all of that.
it is certainly that. but recently its become very trendy to hate Proton, so its just easier to do that instead of thinking. I'm really disappointed in this community
Most people aren't privacy-conscious enough to care who gets what data
I assume most people who pay for proton don’t fall into this category
Perhaps, and if they do indeed care and read that blog, maybe they'll share it with friends who don't have a clue.
im not an expert at criticism, but I think its fair from their part.
I mean, can you remind me what are the hardware requirements to run deepseek locally?
oh, you need a high-end graphics card with at least 8 GB VRAM for that*? for the highly distilled variants! for more complete ones you need multiple such graphics card interconnected! how do you even do that with more than 2 cards on a consumer motherboard??
how many do you think have access to such a system, I mean even 1 high-end gpu with just 8 GB VRAM, considering that more and more people only have a smartphone nowadays, but also that these are very expensive even for gamers?
and as you will read in the 2nd referenced article below, memory size is not the only factor: the distill requiring only 1 GB VRAM still requires a high-end gpu for the model to be usable.
so my point is that when talking about deepseek, you can't ignore how they operate their online service, as most people will only be able to try that.
I understand that recently it's very trendy, and cool to shit on Proton, but they have a very strong point here.
Just because the average consumer doesn’t have the hardware to use it in a private manner does not mean it’s not achievable. The article straight up pretends self hosting doesn’t exist.
of course, move the ducking goalposts! buying a big yacht is also achievable, technically! but very little of the people can actually do it.
don't forget what did OP say:
failing to make it clear that the reason people love Deepseek is that you can download and it run it securely on any of your own private devices or servers
don't believe me? look at the post text. this is as large a misunderstanding as the Eiffel Tower. Virtually nobody can run it on their private devices, that fraction of a percent is basically a rounding error.
I'm so tired of this fucking bullshit. but let's hate proton for it if that's what's trendy!
The 1.5B version that can be run basically on anything. My friend runs it in his shitty laptop with 512MB iGPU and 8GB of RAM (inference takes 30 seconds)
You don't even need a GPU with good VRAM, as you can offload it to RAM (slower inference, though)
I've run the 14B version on my AMD 6700XT GPU and it only takes ~9GB of VRAM (inference over 1k tokens takes 20 seconds). The 8B version takes around 5-6GB of VRAM (inference over 1k tokens takes 5 seconds)
The numbers in your second link are waaaaaay off.
There are plenty of other online platforms where you can use the unmodified model without siphoning your data to China. The model itself is just an offline blob and doesn’t need to be modified to make a “more secure” and “privacy friendly” version like the article says it does, because the model is not tasked with collecting and sharing your data. The author doesn’t seem to be aware of that.
he's probably right. the company wants to be disruptive, and it's normal for any company to steal data. you can self host the current model, but that doesn't mean this will always be the case. certainly they will want to make a profit at some point. it's day 1 silicon valley shit
Guys I know OpenAI is not clear, its as bad as deepseek and even worse, BUT you have to realize, that most people don't give a fuck about running deepseek locally, they just download deepsek app and use it, which is more privacy intrusive even than ClosedAI. Giving information to China, when you live on the west is like giving russians information, when you live in Ukraine. We are on constant war with China, because we are democratic, they are communism, and we cannot just give them our data for free, therefore I have to admit PROTON IS RIGHT about deepseek being "deepsneak"
As a queer person I don't really care at this point if China or Russia is tracking me. They aren't the ones who are currently stripping me and others of rights and so many other things.
I don't trust any governments on this front, but the government I live under is way more of a concern.
Is China in the room with you right now?
Propaganda got ya good bud. Sure. It's important but Jesus. Lol. ChatGPT does the same shit but doesn't let me run it locally. Fuck ChatGPT
we are democratic, they are communism, and we cannot just give them our data for free,
You got a lot to learn but this statement gave me serious loolz
China isn't communist and America isn't democratic. They both suck way worse than that.
China is not communist, they are market-captialistic, one-party highly authoritarian state. "socialism" and "cmmunism" is just used to make them sound better and more legitimate than they are.
lib parrot comment
Are you even a communist?
Name all AES
The PRC has a Socialist Market Economy. The presence of private ownership in an economy isn't enough to determine its structure, otherwise the inverse would apply and the US's publicly owned structures would make it Socialist. Rather, what determines the "label" of an economy is which is primary, public ownership and planning, or markets and profits, and where its heading. Ie, do markets serve the interests of the public sector and are subservient to it, or does the public sector serve the private sector and the pursuit of profits?
"I don't care if rus or china".. Guys you really don't think. If you lived in Ukraine, would you care about giving russians address where you live? Then why you don't care giving them your data, when you live on the west? Because we are not physically fighting rus/china doesn't mean we are not on the war with them. I said it is great Deepseek is possible to host locally, but no one cares, everyone use their app anyway, and this is the problem, as it is even worse than using ClosedAI.
I want Russia to win (and it will) and I want China to win (and it will). My use of an LLM isn't going to make one lick of difference one way or the other, but if it did, I would help it in any and every conceivable way.
You are a fucking nerd for thinking you have more "privacy" to lose to China than to the profiteering, rent-seeking silicon valley bastards who are already and right now exploiting the fuck outta you.
Pretty rich coming from Proton, who shoved a LLM into their mail client mere months ago.
wait, what? How did I miss that? I use protonmail, and I didn't see anything about an LLM in the mail client. Nor have I noticed it when I check my mail. Where/how do I find and disable that shit?
https://proton.me/blog/proton-scribe-writing-assistant
.