4 ms·
Many of the brand-name VPNs are owned by the same parent company. They were gobbled up one by one.
by stevoski 2y ago
Many of the brand-name VPNs are owned by the same parent company. They were gobbled up one by one.
- mentalgear 2y agocare to provide which one / details ?
- dngray 2y agoFunnily enough Windscribe did an article on this: - https://kumu.io/Windscribe/vpn-relationships https://kumu.io/Windscribe/vpn-relationships - https://windscribe.com/vpnmap https://windscribe.com/vpnmap The main two that parent poster would be talking about would be "Kape Technologies" and "Ziff Davis VPNs". We also did an article in 2019 https://www.privacyguides.org/articles/2019/11/20/the-trouble-with-vpn-and-privacy-review-sites https://www.privacyguides.org/articles/2019/11/20/the-troubl... They do a lot of astro-turfing with "review websites" that aren't actually independent at all.
- Ylpertnodi 2y agoMullvad very rarely (if ever) get mentioned on vpn review sites. So I've used them for the last several years.
- datadrivenangel 2y agoAnd they're doing print advertising!
- kirb 2y agoAny idea why there hasn’t been much if any enforcement from the FTC and co about the sketchy VPN review blogs? Seems like especially Lina Khan’s FTC would be interested to find a way, because giving the impression of an independent review and then adding a little “actually we’re extremely biased” disclaimer somewhere doesn’t seem like it should be acceptable. They might be offshore, but they do plenty of business with US creators.
- bluehatbrit 2y agoI think GP was probably exaggerating but there are far fewer owning companies than actual vpns. This article does a decent job of showing it https://vpnpro.com/blog/hidden-vpn-owners-unveiled-97-vpns-23-companies/ https://vpnpro.com/blog/hidden-vpn-owners-unveiled-97-vpns-2... but may be a bit out of date now (Oct 24). I believe it, or a similar one, made the rounds on HN a year or so ago.
- dngray 2y agoThat website is owned by a VPN company iirc, specifically NordVPN or at least they astroturf for them. Note that on the side there is 1 & 2 VPNs and they're NordVPN and Surfshark which have the same parent relationship as they merged. That's the thing though it makes it look like there's more than one as opposed to just slapping a NordVPN ad there. Illusion of choice. And no they're not exaggerating, have a look at the two companies I mentioned and how many "brands" they own.