I'm out
I'm out
I've decided to leave Proton after being a user since 2017. Today, I migrated all my services to my new domain, marking the end of my time with Proton. The recent political noise and price point were no longer justifiable for me. It was a good experience while it lasted. Thanks for the fishes 🐟 🐠
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Any good VPN other than Proton? Almost every one is going down the enshitification route and I'm looking for an alternative.
I've been happy with Mullvad. Good no-log policy, audited regularly, and their servers run on RAM. No port forwarding though, as others mentioned.
Mullvad, ivpn
I think the most common alternatives I see recommended are Mullvad and IVPN. Both have a great track record, but also both lack port forwarding if that is an essential feature for you.
I swear by AirVPN. Not the fastest or fanciest, but they've got port forwarding and are run by an activist org; I've got a lifetime membership IIRC
Be mindful that Italy passed a law forcing vpn's to block pirated content, and AirVPN is based in Italy.
Does this affect anyone outside of Italy though? When I recently signed up for it it had a huge warning saying they don't allow Italian residents to use them, nor do they host any Italian servers, I assume so they don't have to deal with this law at all
I'm not sure how they would distinguish between the two in practice, surely they would block all piracy attempts, not just the ones going to an Italian IP address? It's an unknown for now, but I would be hesitant to use them until it's more clear how this could effect privacy.
Windscribe is a good one in my experience - https://windscribe.com/
PIA has been uneventful for a couple years...
PIA is notable for still having port forwarding; Something many other VPNs have ditched. So on that one point, they’re better than others.
However, 4 or 5 years ago they were bought by a company (Kape Technology, formerly known as Crossrider) that has a history of stuffing adware into their programs. Like their business model was basically:
- Buy popular program
- Stuff it with adware
- Get short term profit off of existing user base
- Abandon program after users have fled
- Repeat
Since a VPN provider’s only real source of legitimacy is public trust, the Kape buyout had a lot of customers fleeing to alternatives like Proton. So far, the PIA app has been fine. But Kape could decide at any point to just pump it full of adware and run away with arms full of cash, like they have done in the past. Also, Kape is (or at least was, at the time of the buyout) headed by a known Israeli intelligence agent. So that was another big thing that sent customers scrambling to alternatives.
Thanks. That is a useful brakedown of them. Using them for the last year with zero issues but always important to evaluate.