Who owns Express VPN, Nord, Surfshark? VPN relationships explained (2024)

Been saying it for YEARS: 95% of VPNs sell your data. It's where they make their money. It's absolutely insane the push-back I get when I say this online. I get downvoted to hell and back.

Source: I bought this data from VPN companies... Hell, you can inject ads and surveys if you want!

Re: Who owns Express VPN, Nord, Surfshark? VPN relationships explained (2024)

#7

Post by bilegeek » Mon, Oct 06, 2025, 9:01 PM UTC

Dylan16807 wrote: post #5

plmpsu wrote: post #4

Just pay for and use Mullvad.

I did until they killed port forwarding.

OOC what's your current favored provider? AirVPN? Proton?

Re: Who owns Express VPN, Nord, Surfshark? VPN relationships explained (2024)

#8

Post by justapassenger » Mon, Oct 06, 2025, 9:02 PM UTC

Is there any other real world usecases for VPN nowadays other than:

1. Getting access to geolocked data

2. Torrenting "Linux ISOs"

?

Re: Who owns Express VPN, Nord, Surfshark? VPN relationships explained (2024)

#9

Post by elorant » Mon, Oct 06, 2025, 9:04 PM UTC

plmpsu wrote: post #4

Just pay for and use Mullvad.

I do and I like them, but Cloudflare blocks their ips aggressively.

Re: Who owns Express VPN, Nord, Surfshark? VPN relationships explained (2024)

#10

Post by octo888 » Mon, Oct 06, 2025, 9:06 PM UTC

bilegeek wrote: post #7

Dylan16807 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did until they killed port forwarding.

OOC what's your current favored provider? AirVPN? Proton?

I tried Airvpn but the MacOS client is beyond trash.

And the website just gives 2005 amateur PHP coder vibes. Not just the design. The session expiry is seems very long - I hadn't visited for a few days and I'm still logged in. I'd be surprised if it wasn't infinite.