Are they even worth it? Help is appreciated.
Nord definitely is popular but it is not generally regarded as the best choice due to concerns around controversy from a year ago.
https://techcrunch.com/2019/10/21/nordvpn-confirms-it-was-hacked/
I see a lot of people recommend Mullvad but personally I can't comment on it because I haven't used it, although I'm planning on switching when my PIA subscription ends. When it comes to VPNs though it's important to remember that they are not a one stop shop for privacy on the internet even if their ads make it seem that way.
However if you're just trying to torrent just find a reputable one with no logs and bittorrent support and you'll be good lol.
I use mullvad. You don’t need personal details to use it, accounts are just randomly generated numbers with the amount of access time associated to it. Allegedly payment info isn’t associated to accounts, and if you’re still that paranoid they have an option to pay by mailing them cash. It costs a flat €5 per 30 days, they don’t have sales or discounts for buying time in bulk.
That said the only situations where I think a VPN service is worth using are when you’re doing something illegal (even if it’s as minor as piracy), trying to get around location-based content blockers, or frequently have to use public wi-fi. Good opsec will always be more important.
Depends where you’re browsing from. How worried you are your online activity is being actively watched etc. I don’t particularly like them, but proton seems pretty good. Go to privactools.io to learn about the best privacy tools. The biggest steps are de googling your life and then go from there.
I have been using AirVPN for a long time, and they currently have a sale. They'll have another sale for Black Friday and then Christmas.
Airvpn (run by hacktivists in Italy), Cryptostorm (Iceland), Mullvad (Sweden), iPredator (Sweden, cofounded by Peter Sunde of TPB). All of these are no-logs afaik. And outside US jurisdiction for their main operations.
They vary in price, but most are at least $5 a month when you pay for a year. They do take Bitcoin and altcoins afaik.
You want a VPN that supports at least 256-bit encryption for the actual data (not authentication), that appears to be the highest you can get. If the VPN provider uses AES cryptography for OpenVPN, you can run it on an Intel AES-NI computer which will make it faster by using hardware to do the cryptography.
No logs is also important. But note that if you are connected when they receive an order to log data or law enforcement request, "no logs" does not protect you.
But VPN is not as anonymous as something like Tor Browser or JonDo which are designed to prevent browser fingerprinting. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Java_Anon_Proxy. JonDo/removed also is multihop, like Tor.
If you could run JonDo or Tor + VPN that would be best. You could also chain proxies (advanced).
Every year TorrentFreak interviews a bunch of VPN operators about their logging policies, data requests they have received etc.
I've used Airvpn, Mullvad, and Private Internet Access.
A cheap VPN I found is Fastest VPN, they have $40/5 years plan here: fastestvpn.com/5years. But I haven't tried them. Was going to.
What do you want to do with it? I would need to know what you expect out of it before recommending something or stating worth.
That said among others I've used AirVPN and can recommend them. They have sales around the holiday season and it's cheapest if you buy more than a year.
If you're torrenting you can absolutely get much much more than your money's worth out of them.
But again I don't know what you want it for so I can't say what it might be worth to you. Some people just don't want their ISP to see what they're doing. Others would only turn it on for piracy.
Be warned that PIA is not trustworthy and I wouldn't use them.
Honestly you shouldn't trust a VPN that's free. Most of the time it means you are the product in one way or another. That and the speed is terrible lol.
