Live data from Hacker News

PIA VPN to be acquired by malware company founded by former Israeli spy

telegra.ph

81–90 of 381 posts

Re: PIA VPN to be acquired by malware company founded by former Israeli spy

#81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for your recommendations. We are working on and hope to go beyond the world of trust. We are now, the most transparent VPN as there are requirements to be transparent when you are a public company. We don't want people to be stuck with having to blindly believe in and trust us like other VPNs. Don't trust. Verify.

WTF are you talking about? You're a "public company" so you are transparent, enough so that people can verify what you do? WAT That's like saying I can trust Philip Morris International and Altria that they would never downplay the carcinogenic properties of tobacco products because they are public companies.

I mean, there's actually an active lawsuit against Altria for securities fraud Altria lying about JUUL to their investors. Similar lawsuits are common. Being a public company gives people with lots of money and lawyers (i.e. investors) motivation to make sure that the company's core value proposition isn't a big fat lie.

I don't think that alone is sufficient evidence to immediately completely trust Kape, but it's worth some points in my book. And if the lawyers don't pull out any dirty laundry after a while, I'm going to assume there isn't any.

Re: PIA VPN to be acquired by malware company founded by former Israeli spy

#83
post #82

https://riseup.net please donate if you use it

Riseup support leftist terrorists which are protected by the state. This is likely also run indirectly by the NSA or Israeli spy orgs.

Don't you want a VPN to be content neutral?

Re: PIA VPN to be acquired by malware company founded by former Israeli spy

#84
post #3

Former PIA user who recently just moved to Mullvad [1]. Very transparent about their operations and they don't require any information from you to open an account. You can even mail them cash or pay with cryptocurrency to avoid having your real identity financially linked to your subscription. [1] https://mullvad.net/en/

What is it that you believe that PIA is doing or is likely to do, that you believe this service is not/will not be doing?

Re: PIA VPN to be acquired by malware company founded by former Israeli spy

#85
post #42
post #4

This article and articles like this miscast Kape in an incorrect light. To be clear, in the past the company was known as CrossRider and provided a developer SDK that could be used to integrate with browsers. Unfortunately, CrossRider didn't do enough to prevent malware (like platforms these days and their fake news) and the platform was used by some bad people for bad purposes. When the new management team of CrossR…

Changing of ownership fundamentally resets the trust we all had in PIA, which was due to you having proven in court you deliver on what you declare. And in the VPN world, trust is fundamental. I am still surprised you didn't see this coming.

> And in the VPN world, trust is fundamental.

Why do you say this? Isn't it generally believed that most/all large VPN services are monitored specifically by the governments of the countries in which they operate?

Re: PIA VPN to be acquired by malware company founded by former Israeli spy

#86
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, I do my best to hedge relying on trust. But Kape is just way too beyond the pale. Perhaps it's unfair, but the association with Israeli intelligence, and so indirectly with NGO Group and the NSA, is just too much.

In the security and cryptography community I think you'd be hard pressed to find people without similar backgrounds. I think being exposed to how insecure the world is and to what levels drives people to secure the world and empowers people to provide privacy and security to people. Some people whistleblow, while others develop software, and many lecture and teach people.

> Some people whistleblow, while others develop software, and many lecture and teach people.

And most have no problems with what they saw or did, and many used the contacts and knowledge gained from that background to further their civilian careers in the field and continue to maintain those connections and shared goals therewith.

Re: PIA VPN to be acquired by malware company founded by former Israeli spy

#87
post #83
post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Riseup support leftist terrorists which are protected by the state. This is likely also run indirectly by the NSA or Israeli spy orgs.

Don't you want a VPN to be content neutral?

Sure. Riseup is not neutral however.

Re: PIA VPN to be acquired by malware company founded by former Israeli spy

#88
post #75

What do people use these VPN services for? Is it mostly for pirating, or public wifi users, or people that don't want their ISPs to know what they're doing? It all seems like niche use cases.

This might be not the case in the US, but outside VPN is very often used for opposite. Half of legal video / music / etc streaming companies have content locked behind per-country limitations and licensing. So if you want to pay for content you'll often need to pretend that you're from US.

For piracy it's cheaper to setup seedbox.

Re: PIA VPN to be acquired by malware company founded by former Israeli spy

#89
post #85
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Changing of ownership fundamentally resets the trust we all had in PIA, which was due to you having proven in court you deliver on what you declare. And in the VPN world, trust is fundamental. I am still surprised you didn't see this coming.

> And in the VPN world, trust is fundamental. Why do you say this? Isn't it generally believed that most/all large VPN services are monitored specifically by the governments of the countries in which they operate?

...no?

Re: PIA VPN to be acquired by malware company founded by former Israeli spy

#90
post #14

Disappointed. I've been with PIA for a few years now and I always recommended them and loved their support. I just cancelled my annual subscription which was due to expire in 100 days. Vote with your wallet. Any recommendations for a new VPN provider?

Me too. I cancelled my subscription about a week ago when I first heard of it (and I explained why on their cancellation form). I'm looking at Mullvad and NordVPN. I know Nord had a MITM attack on a Finnish datacenter a few months ago and didn't immediately notify affected users. I'm having trouble understanding what it says about Nord's culture and likely behavior in the future. On a technical level, it's pretty bad…

Astrill. Not the cheapest but I am very happy with it. Also to circumvent GFC
Post reply on HN