I see people say that NordVPN is a bad choice all the time, but I’ve never seen any credible evidence that they’re not trustworthy. Can anyone provide any sources with valid reasons to avoid their service? I only know that they had some servers hacked in 2018, but it seems as though they took that very seriously and upgraded their hardware and encryption accordingly. I’m just trying to decide if I want to start looking at alternatives, but honestly I’m pretty satisfied with my experience so far.

  • alokir@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I don’t know why others don’t like them but I personally dislike them and Express because of false advertising.

    They make it seem like a vpn protects you from everything online, from hackers, phishing attacks, viruses etc and provides absolute privacy no matter what. This is not what a vpn does.

    I also wonder how they can get away with marketing themselves as a way to get around geoblocking. I don’t personally mind this part but I assume it’s a legal gray area for them so they do it until they can get away with it.

  • Linker95@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Wasn’t NordVPN that provider that said they were no log and then a hack happened and exposed that they did, in fact, retain logs of user activity? Am I mixing them up with someone else?

    • Cinner@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      That’s happened with almost every VPN provider that has claimed to be no-log and then got a government subpoena. At that point you have 2 options: A.) Shut down, or B.) Code a technical way to capture the requested information for that user.

      Sometimes they do choose to shut down and sometimes there isn’t a technically feasible way to get the information.

  • ohmyiv@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I use a different VPN, but honestly, I wouldn’t use Nord only because of their ads and sponsorships. It’s kind of a lame excuse, but they wore me out with that.

    • Labototmized@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Anything that’s so heavily advertised is a big red flag to me. To me it feels like they’re spending more on advertising than making a decent product and hoping people buy it instead of letting the product speak for itself. But that’s not necessarily only about Nord…

  • Barbieque@programming.dev
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    1 year ago

    None of the other answers I’m seeing are the actual reasons you shouldn’t trust more specifically. The reason you shouldn’t trust them is because a few years ago they had a data breach. It was relatively small and wouldn’t have effected many if any people but the problem was they didn’t disclose it and tried to bury it. It wasn’t found out about until a few years later. That should tell you if they had a major data breach that did affect you they would try to hide that from you and you would never know unless a you were made aware through other means.

    Source: https://www.techradar.com/news/whats-the-truth-about-the-nordvpn-breach-heres-what-we-now-know

  • Gingerlegs@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I had it for a few years, not a single problem.

    Ever since iOS 16, it’s a nightmare. It’s been almost a year. I’ve tried proton’s free vpn, no issues. So I guess I’m going to buy theirs now.

    I don’t think this is what you’re really referring to, but this has been my experience. Lol

  • TheFogan@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Personally my biggest distrust of nord comes from their ads. Most notably one where they anthromorphized a guys smart TV, Roomba and phone talking about him when he leaves the room, and others that basically totally misrepresent what a vpn does.

    In short, your TV, Phone, etc… most likely share and compile information because of the ACCOUNTS they need to function. using a VPN will do NOTHING to stop google from knowing any android data, Your devices don’t hear eachother by listening to the network, which is almost all going to be encrypted protocols anyway, but by sharing accounts.

    In short, I’ve always found nords comercials constantly misleading on what a VPN can and can’t protect you from, and to me it seems that’s largely so they can market them to people who don’t actually have any use for them, and worse doing it to make people feel like they are “protecting themselves” from something that they are just as vulnerable to with the vpn.

  • slugworth@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I think the reason you stated is probably the main reason for most of the hate. I’ve been a Nord user for years and have no complaints. However, I am currently considering switching to Firefox VPN because I want to financially support Firefox development and that’s one of the best ways to do it.

    • Miqo@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 year ago

      If that’s the worst of it, then I guess I don’t have anything to worry about. Thank you!

      • TinyPizza@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        I believe they keep history logs that can be subpoenaed and tied to you as evidence. I also believe that is true of most of the heavily advertised services. Check out PIA

    • BuffLettuce@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      Isn’t the Firefox VPN just a rebrand of Mullvad or something? Like they just use their servers and put in their logo?

      I have been using PIA for the last few years and I am personally pretty happy. I had some issues with Nord connect and speed a few years back. PIA on wireguard has worked great for me. I have a gigabit connection and although I can’t hit that with pia, my Unraid SabNZB hits over 70MB/s easy which is great

      • TinyPizza@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        PIA can be a little slow, but the big difference (and reason I use it) is that they don’t keep any logs. A VPN provider gets a subpoena and they will turn over the history of what you did under there service. To my knowledge PIA is one of the few (like 2-3 I thought) that keeps no records and couldn’t cooperate if they wanted to. I’m like 7 years deep with them and they still roll out new features and servers all the time. I consider them a pillar of what a VPN should be.

  • Awwab@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    No issues personally with NordVPN but they have made me some cash by causing some people I provide tech support for to be unable to access their wifi connected printer until I disabled the lan blocking feature.