> The obvious solution would be "we don't take down unless there's a court order", but then you'd get exposé pieces saying how protonmail is a den for drug dealers/pedophiles/doxxers/cyber criminals

I think it'd be crazy to make a service worse because of worry over potential hit pieces that might whine about a perfectly reasonable policy. It isn't as if Proton Mail hasn't been accused of those things before anyway (along with accusations of being a honeypot and not private enough).

It's better to have integrity and fight for your users than to cave just to avoid click bait articles by people with irrational views.