I’ve been using Proton for many years now and have been happy with it.
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The thing that would fail me with Proton is the inability to search messages. I’m incredibly reliant on search to answer so many questions in my life (which kid has a doctor’s appointment on the 17th? etc.).
I’m just not diligent enough about tagging to use that as an alternative. I do love the idea of fully encrypted mail, and I have a Proton account for Reasons, but I don’t think I could ever use it as my daily driver.
(Would genuinely be interested to learn how Proton users avoid / work around / etc. the intrinsic limitations of encrypted mail.)
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I’m confused. I seem to be able to search my emails in Proton.
How to search your Proton Mail messages | Proton.
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Huh. Is this new(ish)? I definitely possibly pretty sure maybe recall that it just wasn’t a possibility on the web client when I set up my account.
Pretty cool, and I guess this is the only way it would make sense for message content searching to work under encryption.
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Jesus fuck, the patent is dated 17 December 2024, and talks about "treating or preventing … (ADHD), an autism spectrum disorder, Asperger syndrome¹, childhood disintegrative disorder², overactive disorder³, pervasive developmental disorder⁴.
1: sic “Asperger's Syndrome”; no longer a diagnostic thing: subsumed into Autism Spectrum Disorder.
2: no longer a diagnostic thing: subsumed into Autism Spectrum Disorder.
3: sic “overactive disorder associated with mental retardation and stereotyped movements”, which is an ICD diagnosis, not DSM, and in anycase seems to be basically ADHD with a comorbid intellectual disability, and nobody uses it
4: no longer a diagnostic thing: subsumed into Autism Spectrum Disorder.
It’s supposed to be injecting a controllable frequency into the vagus nerve. Through the skin with magnetic stimulation.
It talks a lot about how the DSM 5 grouping into one ASD is bad and wrong because clearly there’s a difference between Kanner’s (although it doesn’t use that name), and Asperger’s autisms, and PDD-NOS.
Apparently, “rubella exposure [has] been shown to be a significant causative agent[].”
Oh god. No, just no.
At least it’s not electric shocks?
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I question the authenticity of this. When you click on the link in the bsky post, you get “unauthorized” as the only response. I do not know what this actually means, but I can’t find the original documents. If this is real, there is not a deep enough pit of hell for these asshats.
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It is real. 
Hard to tell through the jargon, but it appears to be for use on pregnant women and people with autism. I suppose this is the new electrical shock backpack? It seems way too much like the eltrical shock treatment people are attempting to get the FDA to ban before the asshole ruins everything
Claims
- A method for treating a developmental condition or disorder, comprising: positioning an electrode in contact with an outer skin surface of a pregnant woman to treat the developmental condition or disorder in a fetus within the pregnant woman; generating an electrical impulse with an energy source transmitting the electrical impulse through the electrode and the outer skin surface to a nerve within the pregnant woman, wherein the electrical impulse is sufficient to modify the developmental condition or disorder in the fetus, wherein the electrical impulse comprises a frequency of about 1 kHz to about 20 kHz.
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I want to see one, just one, legit scientific paper validating this. I know you can put a shock collar on a person and cause them pain, but to claim that this will alter the development of a fetus in any positive way would be contrary to all current scientific literature. Maternal stress does no good thing to a baby at any stage of development. We do simulate maternal stress by administering stress hormones if a preterm delivery is unavoidable to hurry lung maturation a bit, no clue if this is the kernel of truth that this is built on, but NO FUCKING WAY does this do what they say it does!
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I doubt there’s any, but given the people America just put in charge, I suspect scientific validation’s a thing of the past. It’s “Snake Oil” time again 
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Here’s my take on this, as a biomedical engineer who retired from the Center for Devices at the US FDA. Despite mostly being a materials/mechanics guy, I have some knowledge of electrical stimulation just from osmosis. /credentials
And please note: I’m not defending the company; just trying to give some insight.
Summary
There’s a difference between electric shock devices like those used at the Judge Rotenberg Center, and transcutaneous electrical neural stimulation (TENS) used for various medical conditions. There are all kinds of legitimate uses for them – e.g., pain management. Here’s a list that’s the result from a search on the Cleveland Clinic website:
Search Cleveland Clinic | Cleveland Clinic
These use a (relatively) low voltage and current to stimulate nerves to treat legitimate medical problems, not for behavior modification. They may cause some pain, for some patients it’s worth the discomfort. The main problem is what needs to be treated exactly?
The people getting the patent appear to be with a company called Electrocore Inc.. This company has a number of devices, all of which work (if they do, that is) by stimulating the vagus nerve that runs down the neck. For example, they have one hand-held device that they claim treats cluster headaches and migraines. I would imagine the power they put out is relatively minimal and may cause some tingling or mild pain but that’s about it. I think the effects are mainly due to the frequency, pulse rate, and pulse shape of the waveform the device puts out. They are used by the patients themselves at home so have control over it. Clinical studies seem to show that it works somewhat better than a placebo.
One problem is this: the vagus nerve controls all sorts of bodily functions. Stimulating it can have all sorts of effects. I suspect Electrocore is exploiting this by finding every single possible use they can to expand their product line (and, more importantly, their bottom line). And because of the arcane law giving FDA control over devices, pre-1976 devices (which includes transcutaneous electrical stimulation), new devices that are “substantially equivalent” to pre-1976 devices can be cleared much more easily than say a new prosthetic heart valve. And there’s something called “feature creep,” where Device A is only slightly different than the pre-1976 device, and Device B is slightly different than Device A, so by the time we get to Device K, it has totally different technology and uses than the original.
Note that getting a patent nowadays seems to be more of a “see, we patented it first” to get ahead of possible competitors. Whether they will actually put out a device claiming this or not is hard to say. Why they used that awful old drawing neck collar is just inexplicable. Do they really expect to have a device that’s locked on to a child?? Maybe they wanted to get the patent written and submitted ASAP. Maybe they heard that someone else was working on something similar.
Conclusions: First, if I’m not mistaken this patent is not for behavior modification, and (hopefully) doesn’t cause pain the way the Mass. center’s devices do. It’s for a different (dubious) purpose. Second, clearly there is NO medical problem that needs to be treated in the patent. It’s like “treating” left-handed people to become right-handed (which of course used to be done). Third, preventing or treating neurodivergence with a device like this sounds like complete bullshit. I just don’t think it would even work, even if it were desirable (which it clearly isn’t). Fourth, IMO this company is just one step above nutraceuticals. Not exactly quackery, since using TENS for pain control has been used for years and is pretty well documented. But trying to sort out what kind of electrical signal does what when stimulating something as complex as the vagus nerve sounds like a big ask.
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This is my takeaway. Whether it is actually a torture device or not, there is no way it can do what it says it does and only succeeds in further othering an already very vulnerable population. I think I recall the patent office does not actually require a device be proven functional to grant patent protection, only that it be new. This is a new piece of shit, and nothing more.
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I agree.
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I thought I was pissed off reading the headline and blurb, but then I read the article. I don’t even have words for this. 
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Yeah, the article is way worse
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The abstract (I don’t have time to get into the details right nit) certainly seems to think it is:
A device comprises an electrode having a contact surface for contacting an outer skin surface of a patient and a power source coupled the electrode. The power source generates and transmits an electrical impulse having a frequency of about 1 kHz to about 20 kHz through the contact surface and the outer skin surface to a nerve within the patient. The electrical impulse is sufficient to modify the behavioral disorder in the patient.
As an AuDHDer, this patent makes me want to break things.
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