American spies have been accused of hacking countless email accounts that were supposedly private, allowing them to peep everything from the ripostes in German Chancellor Angela Merkel's cell phone to, well, who knows? For starters, the service isn't based in Massachusetts, as one might guess, but was incorporated in Switzerland to take advantage of the country's airtight privacy laws,-The New York Observer reports.- Swiss bank accounts have a long and storied tradition of secrecy, making them the financial institution of choice for rich folks who don't want anyone to know the sum of their wealth. ProtonMail's creators met while working at the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Switzerland, and they bonded over the same lament: Former NSA contractor and renowned leaker Edward Snowden's favored email provider, Lavabit, a-leading provider-of privacy-assured email, had been forced to shut down.-

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