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VPN Report – Reviews of the top VPNs

vpnreport.org

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Re: VPN Report – Reviews of the top VPNs

#21

Post by nilved »

mobitar wrote: post #10
joshstrange wrote: post #5

Private Internet Access > A pretty boring company. Extremely transactional. You get in and get out. It delivers its experience the way a utility company would. Sometimes, that may be a good thing. But in this case, since I have choice, I'd rather give my money to a company who would appreciate it a little more — perhaps put it to better use. PIA might be very "transactional" but I like them and I've never had any iss…

They connect on port 80 (HTTP instead of HTTPS) on startup. That's unacceptable for a privacy company.

It's worse than that. Back when I used PIA a few years ago, they would pass your username and password around in the query string, completely plain-text. That was their session mechanism. I sent them an email explaining the problem and got a refund. Their security mistakes, and the fact that they are based in the US, disqualify them for me. I really wish people would recommend someone else.

Re: VPN Report – Reviews of the top VPNs

#22

Post by mobitar »

abstractbeliefs wrote: post #12

Regardless of how you feel about _why_ PIA sponsor the organisations they do, it is surprising to see someone claiming they "perhaps put [their money] to better use" given their record of supporting foss and digital/online rights [1]. Additionally, the characterization as being extremely focused on the tech illiterate I feel isn't really the case either, they have lots of docs about how to use OpenVPN [2]. Thirdly, w…

PIA actually scores as one of the highest on the objective measures. The star count is just a subjective impression and experience with getting it set up. They connect over HTTP on startup instead of HTTPS (which is unacceptable for a privacy company). They then ping almost a hundred servers on startup (no other app does this, at least not to this extent).

Re: VPN Report – Reviews of the top VPNs

#24

Post by throwaway91111 »

Scarbutt wrote: post #11
tptacek wrote: post #6

To steal (and paraphrase) what is basically the perfect summary of this from @SwiftOnSecurity: Commercial VPNs: for when you want all the security of Ukrainian coffee-house wifi from the comfort of your own home. Taylor Swift isn't wrong about this. Use something like Algo to run your own VPN if you have to. If you must use a commercial VPN to get to Netflix or whatever, do it from inside a virtual machine that you u…

I heard VPNs don't work on netflix anymore.

Sort of; they are good at flagging VPN ips but you can always spin up your own to get around this.

Re: VPN Report – Reviews of the top VPNs

#25

Post by dawnerd »

mobitar wrote: post #22
abstractbeliefs wrote: post #12

Regardless of how you feel about _why_ PIA sponsor the organisations they do, it is surprising to see someone claiming they "perhaps put [their money] to better use" given their record of supporting foss and digital/online rights [1]. Additionally, the characterization as being extremely focused on the tech illiterate I feel isn't really the case either, they have lots of docs about how to use OpenVPN [2]. Thirdly, w…

PIA actually scores as one of the highest on the objective measures. The star count is just a subjective impression and experience with getting it set up. They connect over HTTP on startup instead of HTTPS (which is unacceptable for a privacy company). They then ping almost a hundred servers on startup (no other app does this, at least not to this extent).

Don't use their app then. In fact, I can't think of a reason why I'd install any vpns app if they support openvpn.

Re: VPN Report – Reviews of the top VPNs

#26

Post by tyingq »

throwaway91111 wrote: post #24
Scarbutt wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I heard VPNs don't work on netflix anymore.

Sort of; they are good at flagging VPN ips but you can always spin up your own to get around this.

I assume they are pretty good about blocking popular VPS host ip addresses too, though.

So not just spinning up your own, but finding a VPS host they don't yet know about.

Re: VPN Report – Reviews of the top VPNs

#27

Post by wepple »

> Extremely bland, stock-photo website. I felt uncomfortable giving them my email address, let alone my payment info.

That's not valuable information.

> A heavily marketed product lacking inspiration which I ultimately couldn't get to work properly.

At this point you've given up even trying. It's not a useful comparison any longer.

Re: VPN Report – Reviews of the top VPNs

#28

Post by bpicolo »

abstractbeliefs wrote: post #12

Regardless of how you feel about _why_ PIA sponsor the organisations they do, it is surprising to see someone claiming they "perhaps put [their money] to better use" given their record of supporting foss and digital/online rights [1]. Additionally, the characterization as being extremely focused on the tech illiterate I feel isn't really the case either, they have lots of docs about how to use OpenVPN [2]. Thirdly, w…

That stock photo of kids on bikes on their homepage feels so out of place hah

Re: VPN Report – Reviews of the top VPNs

#30

Post by davepeck »

LeoPanthera wrote: post #13

This guy has been reviewing VPN services for a while and has put together an incredibly comprehensive table as well as a selection of more detailed reviews, selected from the list at random so as to remain impartial. Recommended. https://thatoneprivacysite.net/vpn-section/ For example, TunnelBear scores highly on security, but poorly on ethics.

I suspect that, for less savvy potential customers (read: the vast majority of them), "That One Privacy Site" can do more harm than good.

I wrote a bit about choosing VPNs, and about my concerns with TOPS, here: https://davepeck.org/2017/04/16/why-its-hard-to-choose-a-vpn...

PS: Since this is HN, I just want to say that if you can, you should run your own VPN. Use Algo, full stop -- it's put together by some of the best in the business. If you do decide to go with a third party provider, hopefully the six criterion I suggest in my post are helpful.

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