Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

NordVPN library and client code open-sourced

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 276 posts

Re: NordVPN library and client code open-sourced

#11

Post by bilekas »

mistrial9 wrote: post #4

why do they spend so much money on ads? seems like more budget than could be explained via sales to civilians

They're certainly not doing it out of the goodness of their heart. Or for the goodness of privacy online.. Doesn't leave many good options but you can be sure, they're not losing money.

Re: NordVPN library and client code open-sourced

#12

Post by PlutoIsAPlanet »

msla wrote: post #5

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVDQEoe6ZWY That's a video about NordVPN's dishonest advertising and how deeply it's infected YouTube. https://www.pcmag.com/news/nordvpn-ad-banned-for-exaggeratin... > The UK's Advertising Standards Agency(Opens in a new window) has banned a NordVPN commercial for misleading viewers about the privacy risks of using a public Wi-Fi network without also having a VPN. In essence: HTTPS al…

It's pretty silly when you see it being advertised on various high profile YouTube channels as some kind of magic protection that protects you from ID theft, password leaks, viruses etc.

Re: NordVPN library and client code open-sourced

#14

Post by throw0101b »

This reminds me of the 'original' 2019 video by Tom Scott called "This Video Is Sponsored By [redacted] VPN" where he explains most of the reasons listed to use VPN by ads is useless:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVDQEoe6ZWY

And then a few years later with "My robot double sells out (so I don't have to)" he did a follow-up listing useful reasons (geo-based content, better prices on vacation sites, etc) which was sponsored by NordVPN:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXlQuTRSmzc&t=6m25s

Re: NordVPN library and client code open-sourced

#15

Post by gjsman-1000 »

mjdowney wrote: post #9

Since there is so much criticism here of NordVPN (in general, not for open-sourcing), what are the VPNs that people like?

Take a look at Mullvad for a VPN done right. Completely anonymous usernames, randomly generated, accepts cryptocurrency or cards purchased anonymously at a physical store with cash.

One concerning issue is the Swedish jurisdiction. The nordic countries are better at privacy, but Sweden is a 14-eyes nation. But I can't say it's better or worse than NordVPN's... Panama.

Re: NordVPN library and client code open-sourced

#16

Post by acatton »

mjdowney wrote: post #9

Since there is so much criticism here of NordVPN (in general, not for open-sourcing), what are the VPNs that people like?

I am not related to them, I'm just a user of it. But Mullvad.net is the only decent VPN. (They're the one Mozilla chose to provide their VPN infrastructure)

They've been audited https://mullvad.net/en/blog/2022/6/22/vpn-server-audit-found...

I have no financial incentive to vouch for them. But what do you care, I'm just a random guy on the internet.

Re: NordVPN library and client code open-sourced

#18

Post by politician »

I'd love to learn why they have a mix of Go and Rust. Did they initially use Go and then migrate? Do they use Go for some things and Rust for other things? Have labor market dynamics played a role (lots of Rust devs from crypto startups becoming available)?

It would be great to hear from their CTO on the rationale.

Re: NordVPN library and client code open-sourced

#19

Post by phantom784 »

msla wrote: post #5

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVDQEoe6ZWY That's a video about NordVPN's dishonest advertising and how deeply it's infected YouTube. https://www.pcmag.com/news/nordvpn-ad-banned-for-exaggeratin... > The UK's Advertising Standards Agency(Opens in a new window) has banned a NordVPN commercial for misleading viewers about the privacy risks of using a public Wi-Fi network without also having a VPN. In essence: HTTPS al…

Since making that, Tom Scott has done sponsorships for NordVPN (but has always avoided the exaggerated claims from what I've seen).

Re: NordVPN library and client code open-sourced

#20

Post by ehPReth »

acatton wrote: post #7

Reminder that it looks like NordVPN does shady stuff: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29285988 Allegedly, they are using their customers as botnets to resell traffic from residential IPs, mostly for scraping, through their other business "Oxylabs".

I hear there's a dirty secret that more and more companies are doing this to make things like Netflix that block VPNs "just work" though their services. Not sure how true this is or how widespread, though.
Post reply on HN