Andy Yen, founder and CEO of Proton, takes the 27th Liberal Award
JFZH cites his record on privacy, start-ups, and tech sovereignty
The November 12 ceremony coincides with Switzerland’s second surveillance consultation
Andy Yen, founder and CEO of Proton, has won the 2026 Liberal Award. The prize is handed out each year by the Jungfreisinnige Kanton Zürich (JFZH), the Young Liberals of the Canton of Zurich, to someone judged to have made a significant contribution to a liberal society. His company is best known for its privacy suite: Proton Mail, Proton VPN – one of the best VPN services on the market – along with Proton Drive and Proton Pass. The JFZH credits Yen with building a European alternative to the major US tech platforms, and with making the case for privacy at a time when Swiss surveillance rules are back in play. From CERN to a 100-million-user company
(Image credit: Proton) Yen’s route into tech ran through physics. He holds a PhD in particle physics from Harvard and worked as a research scientist at CERN in Geneva before turning to building Proton, which is headquartered in the same city. The company now employs more than 700 people, 60 of them in the Canton of Zurich, and says it serves over 100 million customers worldwide. It’s majority-owned by the non-profit Proton Foundation – a structure Proton presents as a safeguard against the pressures that typically come with venture capital…
