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Problems that forced me to leave ProtonVPN for Mullvad
- jsgo 7y agoNordVPN has seemingly slowed down as of late too. Though there are so many nodes that who knows what’s going on and how prevalent. Previously when connected, my line would go down to 50+ Mbps: perfectly reasonable. Now, I test and it is sub 2 Mbps.
- lettergram 7y agoI used the visionary plan from ProtonVPN and ProtonMail. I personally have found it exceedingly good. I still augment it with my own VPN (easy enough to setup). I do experience slowdowns at peak times, but I also tend to break 30Mb/s speeds - can’t complain
- StavrosK 7y agoCan I ask VPN users here what you use it for? I've personally never found a good use case...
- jfim 7y agoI installed pi hole on my algo VPN, so that I could remove ads from my Android phone without needing to root it.
- StavrosK 7y agoYou can also use the DNS66 Android app for that without root.
- RandomBacon 7y agoAvoid the legal problems that come with torrenting. Spoof my location. Avoid giving trackers my IP address. Avoid ISP throttling. Hopefully my VPN doesn't log. At least my ISP can't log. I'm not concerned about state-level actors, just commercial ones.
- jamesponddotco 7y agoWe build our own WireGuard VPN servers to SSH to other servers. Aside from that, I personally use it to avoid ISP throttling and spoof my location, as @RandomBacon said.
- Insanity 7y agoIn the past I used it for torrenting. Nowadays because it adds a layer of privacy from companies and governments. I trust my government now but I don't have to trust my future government. I am pretty sure I don't do anything illegally, but a future government might not think so. Like in the UK when they wanted to ban porn (I think?). Something harmless today (legally speaking) can become an issue in the future.
- MuffinFlavored 7y agoAre we sure VPNs don't log / turn logs over to federal authority figures if pressed?
- Kaveren 7y agono, though that may constitute fraud depending on the jurisdiction. this is why some VPNs are based in certain countries, such as ProtonVPN in Switzerland. obviously they have to comply with a valid legal request, but depending on the data retention laws in the jurisdiction, there may be nothing to give over. some VPNs definitely lie about logging, maybe most of them. ProtonVPN is one of the least likely ones to do so given their transparency relative to other VPN companies, their ProtonMail service, their infrastructure, and their founder. upstream logging is still possible, and protonvpn is the only VPN service I know of with any of its own infrastructure. it has one datacenter in switzerland and you can use it as a proxy to some of its third party operated endpoints in other countries.
- yjftsjthsd-h 7y agoEmpirically, PIA has no logs to give (per multiple warrants now).
- kingosticks 7y agoThe UK's Age Verification changes (not 'porn ban') has been delayed by another 6 months following some admin screw-up related to informing the EU. It's not really a very good example since it won't be illegal (for the consumer).
- noja 7y agoPublic wifi access.
- Jgrubb 7y agoI was in France in May for the next to the last episode of Game of Thrones. Even though I pay for an HBO subscription, they still wouldn't let me watch it until I VPN'd into my nyc based server.
- gilrain 7y agoAvoiding throttling is huge. Is streaming video mysteriously garbage despite having 100 Mb/s? Connect to a VPN and watch the issues disappear.
- coffeeri 7y agoTo complement the list above, use a private vpn, hosted at home, to access devices and services which are only accessable from home, while being on a remote location. I use it to access my server environment.
- hendersoon 7y agoProtecting my privacy while browsing at work and on unsecured networks like coffeehouse wifi and when traveling. I have a gigabit connection at home so I just run wireguard locally. Works great. Also many mobile plans throttle video to 480p, a VPN bypasses that.
- KozmoNau7 7y agoPrimarily to avoid snooping when using various wifi hotspots out and about in the world and when using roaming data. In addition to that, I don't trust my current or any of the previous governments, and I likely won't trust any future governments. I also don't trust any ISP in my country further than I can throw them, due to government-mandated logging. My workplace does mandatory MITM proxying and logs everything, I'm working on getting around that.
- uncletaco 7y agoI use protonmail so VPN comes as part of the package. I use it at all times with my phone and when I'm away from home with my notebook.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- kmfrk 7y agoIt's weird how, as popular as VPNs are, competing on UX - and not just some cute mascotts and assets - is still not a huge priority. There's always trade-offs to be made for now it seems. And Mullvad doesn't have mobile support yet. Makes you wonder what's gonna happen when Cloudflare's Warp is out of closed beta.
- defrtg_adam 7y ago> And Mullvad doesn't have mobile support yet. You mean (I think) it doesn't have it's own native app. Connecting to Mullvad's VPN works fine on Android using OVPN (as do many of the VPN providers). Sent via LineageOS using Mullvad :P
- noja 7y agoMullvad has mobile support with WireGuard.
- Nevermindmine 7y agoWas it a long time since you tried Mullvad? They revamped their UX making it easier to use not that long ago. And I use Mullvad on my phone following their instructions how to do so. This makes your post a bit confusing.
- kmfrk 7y agoNo mobile app.
- Nevermindmine 7y agoThad like saying Netflix doesn't have Internet support because they haven't created their own web browser. It's just a confusing thing to say.
- Cyph0n 7y agoHow difficult is it to download and open a .ovpn file?
- 1553There 7y ago
- ikeboy 7y agoPIA doesn't work with Google search on some nodes anymore.
- alistproducer2 7y agoI guess it depends on what you're using your VPN for, but I prefer to run my own VPN on a vps. I use vultr and pay $5/mo. I also get to host a collabra server for my nextcloud setup on the same server so it just makes economic sense to use a vps rather than paying $5/mo (or more) to just get a VPN and also not have control of my data.
- traderjane 7y agoDo you have a puppet or bash script for that process?
- alchemism 7y agoHow about an ansible script? https://github.com/StreisandEffect/streisand https://github.com/StreisandEffect/streisand
- msh 7y agoI think algo is considered to be the best solution for this: https://github.com/trailofbits/algo https://github.com/trailofbits/algo
- alchemism 7y agoAgreed - I consider it more of a general purpose VPN (and what I use personally). Streisand is more opinionated, in ways that folks that use Proton services might find appealing.
- Nyr 7y agoI maintain this script: https://github.com/Nyr/openvpn-install https://github.com/Nyr/openvpn-install It's a simple bash script which just gets the job done fast, without dependencies or too much trouble.
- heyoni 7y agoAre you guys vpn’ing on your phones too? Do you just use the built in vpn connection profiles? I’m having trouble getting mine to stay connected to a plain old IPSec tunnel running on my raspberry pi and thinking I probably need a special client for “always on” to work.
- Proven 7y agoOh, another forum comment turned into a blog post...
- nickpsecurity 7y agoI know people on it on Linux. They said it was pretty fast. They haven't griped about it any. It's possible the user's ISP or the Proton client software is causing it. It also might depend on which servers they use given more outages might happen in specific parts of the world vs others.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- DavideNL 7y ago> I feel it’s getting slower and slower > I am not sure if the problem is on ProtonVPN side or my ISP side I may be missing something... but I feel this is a terrible article, not based on any facts/solid research, but based on random experiences caused by "who knows what".
- SkyMarshal 7y agoYou're correct, it's an uninformative article by a non-expert just shilling for Mullvad. Just flag it and ignore.
- fulafel 7y agoIs anyone else bothered by the appropriation of the vpn term for setviced providing access to the public Web without confidentiality? There should be a new name for this.
- Forellen 7y agoI don't use ProtonVPN, but damn... The author starts off his article with "I feel (sic!) it’s getting slower and slower.". Well, what do you mean? Can't you measure the speeds? Are we supposed to take your word for it? Even if he is right about protonVPN getting slower, that's no way of starting off an article... On the second paragraph the author writes "Not only slower, but it also keeps disconnecting".. So, the author is sure that protonVPN is actually getting slower... But I thought he said he simply _felt_ like it was getting slower. Feelings are now equivalent to certainty, apparently. Overall, not a good article, I'm sorry to say.
- SkyMarshal 7y agoYou're correct, and probably getting downvoted by bots or Mullvad voting rings. Just flag the article and move on.
- badrabbit 7y agoIt's just openvpn. If you dislike their app,use vanilla openvpn! As far as instability..yeah it's unstable on the free version because you only get to access highly saturated free access servers. With the paid plan on proton I see disconnects every othet day or so (random servers). I use the free tier as well but I have it automated to where I force a reconnect if destinations are unreachable. I believe proton uses Nord's infrastructure to some capacity? But yeah,not fair at all to compare a free plan with a paid one. Even if they charge 1€/mo,those users are supporting the servers they use. With free,it's unlimited number of users that saturate a free server so you should expect less quality.
- roboys 7y agoCare to share your force reconnect script? I'm sure many would appreciate it.
- badrabbit 7y agoI don't wish to associate this HN account with my github profile. But I think it makes a good project to help you learn a new language.
- zenlot 7y agoYes, NordVPN and ProtonVPN are both owned by Tesonet and runs office in Vilnius, Lithuania.
- SkyMarshal 7y agoFlagging this. The VPN industry is full of companies competing against each other using underhanded social media tactics, astroturfing, bots, sock puppets, etc. This is clearly one of them, just a shill for Mullvad by a likely astroturfing or affiliate blogger who is "not an expert in VPN". There is zero reason why this should be on the HN frontpage.
- shitgoose 7y agofollowing statement on ProtonVPN web site may give a clue: Free Package "Speed: Medium"