Private Internet Access aces its second no-log audit since 2022
  • Deloitte confirms PIA’s no-log claims, with servers running on RAM-only system for maximum privacy.
  • Independent audit verifies PIA’s infrastructure is not vulnerable to third-party exploitation, ensuring online activity remains private.
  • PIA offers full transparency with open-source apps and regular third-party audits, proving its commitment to data protection.
  • WhatsThePoint@lemmy.worldEnglish
    73·
    7 months ago

    I used Nord VPN after a lot of research when I initially started using them years ago. What have you heard about them?

    • Alk@lemmy.worldEnglish
      511·
      7 months ago

      Personally I don’t trust companies who aggressively advertise like they do, but that’s not a real reason grounded in evidence. It just tends to be correct. I recommend Mullvad.

      • randomname01@feddit.nlEnglish
        53·
        7 months ago

        They advertise aggressively because running a VPN is ridiculously profitable. I do agree with your apprehensive feeling, but at the same time their advertisements do make sense.

        • Socsa@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          2·
          7 months ago

          Right,but their YouTube ads also contain a bunch of misleading statements and outright lies about streaming services, privacy and military grade encryption.

      • WhatsThePoint@lemmy.worldEnglish
        36·
        7 months ago

        They didn’t aggressively advertise when I first started using them like 6 years ago. I have yet to see evidence of their no-log policy being broken but it’s hard to trust most companies these days.

        • WamGams@lemmy.caEnglish
          2·
          7 months ago

          I feel like 6 years ago was the height of their marketing. Literally every podcast I listened to had them as a sponsor and maybe half of the YouTube sponsorships were Nord.

          It is because of them most people probably now know what a VPN is, but I feel like their marketing budget is a hundred fold smaller than it used to be.

    • Dark ArcAEnglish
      34·
      7 months ago

      Nord had a very bad incident a few years ago https://techcrunch.com/2019/10/21/nordvpn-confirms-it-was-hacked/

      They were also REALLY late to the disclosure and tried to play it off as “them being responsible”:

      NordVPN said it found out about the breach a “few months ago,” but the spokesperson said the breach was not disclosed until today because the company wanted to be “100% sure that each component within our infrastructure is secure.”

      They (at least were) also very aggressive about advertising (all over YouTube at one point sponsoring all kinds of stuff)… Which is typically the opposite of what you want.

      Proton has had write ups in the past about the VPN review market as well and how a lot of reviews are “whoever pays us the most money is the top VPN.” Proton has a strong enough track record in their other software for doing the right thing and truly valuing security, privacy, and open standards, so I’m inclined to believe them. VPN was one of the first spinoff products they launched when it was still mail, and they did so because some of their more sensitive customers (think journalists in some bad parts of the world) were having to rely on third party VPNs of questionable integrity.

      I trust Mullvad and Proton at this point for VPNs, nobody else.

      • evranch@lemmy.caEnglish
        1·
        7 months ago

        I trust Mullvad and Proton at this point for VPNs, nobody else.

        Any reason you can state not to use AirVPN? I switched to them from Mullvad because they support port forwarding. So far I’ve been very happy with their service.

        Having ads and sponsors blocked I can’t be 100% sure, but I don’t think they advertise at all. I only tried them because of a recommendation on Lemmy. Their site design is very old school which really says “run by nerds and not marketers” to me.

        • Dark ArcAEnglish
          1·
          7 months ago

          I do not know anything about AirVPN specifically.

          Proton does provide port forwarding these days FYI.

          I think “run by nerds not marketers” is a good thing … though I don’t know if a site looking old really means it’s run by nerds lol

          • evranch@lemmy.caEnglish
            1·
            7 months ago

            Yeah I know, but have you seen their site? It’s like an old 90s static HTML page. The main thing I see is that it’s clearly not a glossy “marketing first” service. They’re surviving off of their actual product.

            • Dark ArcAEnglish
              1·
              7 months ago

              Yeah that’s fair. It can definitely go both ways though. Like your sign over your shop can look old because you’re still getting growth/a really nice cash flow without updating the sign or it can look old because you stopped caring a long time ago and you’re just milking what you can from the remaining customers.

              I had a friend who’s ISP was very much in the latter category about a decade ago, charging like $90/mo for 10Mbps (IIRC with a data cap).

    • Lazhward@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      7 months ago

      To counter some of the other comments, them being based in Panama is a huge plus imo, if you’re inclined to do things deemed illegal by local authorities. They have no incentive to comply with government issued search warrants or the like. Most western country-based companies are legally obligated to comply with those requests, or even store information for a number of years. With quantum-based decryption there’s no saying how long even encrypted data will be safe.