Proton CEO Andy Yen has cancelled a series of near company-wide "re-interviews" that would have required employees to explain how they use AI, according to six current employees and audio of a two-hour all-hands meeting obtained by 404 Media. The decision came on Friday, one day after the outlet published an investigation into how Yen pushed AI across the privacy-focused company despite security concerns from staff.
The re-interviews were widely seen internally as a way to identify employees who were not using AI enough, with the possibility of dismissal. Yen told staff the exercise had, unintentionally, already served its purpose by getting people talking about AI. Employees gave mixed reactions, with some calling the reversal damage control rather than real accountability.
What the 404 Media investigation found
The investigation, based on conversations with eight current and one former Proton employee, Slack chats, meeting audio and an AI manifesto written by CTO Bart Butler, described a workplace culture very different from Proton's public image as a careful guardian of privacy.
In one exchange in the company's security Slack channel, an employee asked for at least a few days to pentest newly written code before it went live. Yen replied that this was "bullshit and loser thinking," adding that it is possible to be fast and secure, and told staff to stop handcrafting code and use AI more. Butler's manifesto told engineers their old job was gone and that not embracing AI posed an existential threat to the mission.
Proton employees and users react
Reactions inside Proton were split. One employee told 404 Media that some staff saw the cancellation as progress, while others doubted anything would change because there are no consequences for Yen, who holds the majority of Proton's shares. Another said leadership stated in the same breath that it would keep pushing AI and that the metrics from the re-interviews would become part of performance reviews.
