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There's few use cases outside of placebo. Torrenting without your ISP yelling at you, for one. Getting access to region-locked content, for another. Maybe regio

There's few use cases outside of placebo. Torrenting without your ISP yelling at you, for one. Getting access to region-locked content, for another. Maybe regional pricing? You're right that at the end of the day, it's just someone else seeing where you visit. And frankly, I think VPN users would be a higher target of surveillance anyways. And if the VPN's company is from any 5-9-13-whatever-eyes country, you can assume all that information is being collected by them anyways.

ziddoap 3y ago
One use-case you didn't mention is when the user doesn't want ShadyISP to sell their browsing habits (which are conveniently linked to a billing address, name, and more), despite the user understanding that governments could still potentially have access. >You're right that at the end of the day, it's just someone else seeing where you visit You write this as if it's some trivial little detail. Who that someone is that is privy to your browsing habits is a significant detail.
- Night_Thastus 3y ago
  That's fair. Governments may get it either way, but I doubt they bother to sell the data - and a paid-for VPN obviously wouldn't want to sell it, assuming they're worried about getting caught and losing customers.
- threecheese 3y ago
  No need for $ShadyISP! A 2021 FTC (USA) report on the subscriber-data use policies of six major American ISPs found that: “… many of the ISPs in our study surveil consumers, use and disseminate consumer data, and the privacy implications of such use and dissemination. “ source: https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/reports/look-what-isps-know-about-you-examining-privacy-practices-six-major-internet-service-providers/p195402_isp_6b_staff_report.pdf https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/reports/look-what... Everyone with an internet connection should at least read the Key Findings, just the first few pages of that report. I assume that regional or small ISPs have similar practices, but these big ones have been M&A’d into massive orgs having control of “a much larger and broader cache of consumer data than ever before, without having to explain fully their purposes for such collection and use, much less whether such collection and use is good for consumers.”

ziddoap 3y ago

One use-case you didn't mention is when the user doesn't want ShadyISP to sell their browsing habits (which are conveniently linked to a billing address, name, and more), despite the user understanding that governments could still potentially have access. >You're right that at the end of the day, it's just someone else seeing where you visit You write this as if it's some trivial little detail. Who that someone is that is privy to your browsing habits is a significant detail.

Night_Thastus 3y ago
That's fair. Governments may get it either way, but I doubt they bother to sell the data - and a paid-for VPN obviously wouldn't want to sell it, assuming they're worried about getting caught and losing customers.
threecheese 3y ago
No need for $ShadyISP! A 2021 FTC (USA) report on the subscriber-data use policies of six major American ISPs found that: “… many of the ISPs in our study surveil consumers, use and disseminate consumer data, and the privacy implications of such use and dissemination. “ source: https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/reports/look-what-isps-know-about-you-examining-privacy-practices-six-major-internet-service-providers/p195402_isp_6b_staff_report.pdf https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/reports/look-what... Everyone with an internet connection should at least read the Key Findings, just the first few pages of that report. I assume that regional or small ISPs have similar practices, but these big ones have been M&A’d into massive orgs having control of “a much larger and broader cache of consumer data than ever before, without having to explain fully their purposes for such collection and use, much less whether such collection and use is good for consumers.”