Techprofil ger miljoner till Örebropartiet
www.flamman.se
It-bolaget Mullvads grundare donerade fem miljoner – till parti som vill se ”storskalig återvandring”

Daniel Berntsson, founder of Mullvad, gave a personal donation of 5 million SEK (roughly 450,000€) in 2025 to Örebropartiet. This enormous donation accounted for 72% of the party’s revenue in 2025.

How does this affect Mullvad’s legitimacy as a company advocating for a free and open internet, while also funding a political party whose agenda seem to contradict these values? The official party website (in Swedish) can be found via the link below.

https://orebropartiet.se/om-oss/

  • youmaynotknow@lemmy.zip
    0·
    1 month ago

    I keep hearing about that praise, yet never once have I seen proof of it. Maybe I’m just using the wrong search engine. Might need to Google this.

    • ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.netEnglish
      0·
      1 month ago

      https://theintercept.com/2025/01/28/proton-mail-andy-yen-trump-republicans/

      it came as a surprise last month when Proton CEO Andy Yen praised the Republican Party in a post on X, declaring that “10 years ago, Republicans were the party of big business and Dems stood for the little guys, but today the tables have completely turned.” When the tweet went viral, Proton’s official Reddit account posted a now-deleted comment stating that “Until corporate Dems are thrown out, the reality is that Republicans remain more likely to tackle Big Tech abuses.”

      In response to a request for comment, Proton reiterated the claim that it is a “politically neutral organization,” then went on to state that “regardless of one’s views about the wider Republication platform, if you agree that action is needed on antitrust then the appointment of Gail Slater is a positive thing,” referring to President Donald Trump’s choice to head the Justice Department’s antitrust division. Proton further stated that “Big Tech CEOs are tripping over themselves to kiss the ring precisely because Trump represents an unprecedented challenge to their monopolistic dominance.”

      • youmaynotknow@lemmy.zip
        0·
        1 month ago

        OK, so he said that in January 2025. Just when Trump was taking over, and it did look at the time that the reps were actually at least talking with Proton execs, which is way more than the dems did. Proton reached out to Biden’s team more than once and they never were even given the time of day, Trump’s team got them in to talk. Whatever the environment is today (which I agree is complete shit and everything is ceumbling down because of Trump, Starmer and others), I can’t blame Proton for seeing that when this administration at least talked to them. Having said that, those do not qualify as praises, they qualify as comments on what it looked like at the moment. Praise means: to express a favorable judgment of someone or something. Saying that anyone is ‘more likely’ to do something does not qualify as a praise in my opinion. Much less saying anyone ‘was the evil and now the tables have turned’.

        Anyway, thanks for the info, I was not aware of this, and because of what it is, my thoughts on this remain as they are.

        • ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.netEnglish
          0·
          1 month ago

          We’d already had Trump’s last presidency to know that he wasn’t going to reign in big tech, so the CEO’s positive thoughts and hopefulness for the republican party and Trump’s picks were already insanely out of touch at best, IMO.

          • youmaynotknow@lemmy.zip
            0·
            1 month ago

            I agree that his first term was a shit show, this one is even worse. But regardless, try to put yourself in Yen’s shoes. He pushed to try and get into talks with the Democrats to lobby for privacy, not a hint of interest from them. Tries the same with the Republicans and is received with open doors. What should his comments be?

            I guess I’m just glad I’ve been one of the few people that flat out rejected a green card that was almost 8 years in process because of the way the US has been for the last few years. I’m OK not living there and only visiting my brother every now and then.

            • ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.netEnglish
              0·
              1 month ago

              I would’ve hoped that the CEO of a privacy company would’ve already known that both corporate parties of the US have demonstrated they are anti-privacy.

              His comments also don’t really make sense, since Trump’s first term only ever removed regulations on big tech and monopolies, while Biden’s second term appeared to be taking at least some actions towards regulating and reining them in.

              If we assume Yen really did believe that the second Trump administration would somehow turn a new leaf, then we must also then assume he is either extremely gullible, extremely misinformed, or both. Not something you want to see in someone running a privacy service someone may rely on.