Proton acquires encrypted notes app to expand its offering

Proton was founded in 2014 with the vision of building an internet where privacy is the default through an ecosystem of services accessible to everyone, everywhere, every day. It provides a suite of open-source products to individuals and enterprises such as Proton VPN, Proton Calendar, Proton Drive and Proton Pass, which all leverage the same advanced encryption to give users full control over how and with whom their data is shared.

With the increased demand for more security on the internet, Proton continues to see uptick growth across the entire organization. The first product, Proton Mail, is now the world's largest encrypted email service, with more than 100 million accounts created worldwide as of 2023. In addition, Proton secures more than 50,000 businesses, including some of the world’s largest public and private organizations.

Its community has similarly grown, with active community members including leaders of the Hong Kong protest movement, New York Times journalists, some of the world’s largest corporations, and millions of ordinary citizens in over 180 countries. The company is supported by a team of 400 employees and has offices in Geneva, Zurich, Taipei, Barcelona, Paris, Skopje, Prague and Vilnius.

The addition of Standard Notes’ encryption application to Proton’s product ecosystem reinforces Proton’s commitment to further providing secure solutions. Founded in 2017, Standard Notes is an end-to-end encrypted note-taking application, available on mobile and desktop, used by over 300,000 people. It allows users to protect their personal notes, containing their most intimate and sensitive information, guaranteeing no one else can access them.

Following this acquisition deal, Standard Notes will remain open source, available, and further advanced with new features and updates. As such, the company will continue to operate independently as a separate product while leveraging Proton’s resources and experience to improve reliability and resilience in the long run. “In Proton, we’ve found a partner who shares our focus on protecting privacy. Its teams of engineers are world-class in delivering powerful, user-first technologies that incorporate end-to-end and zero-access encryption. This should help us deliver new features even faster”, as stated by Standard Notes.

(RAN)