Do you use a VPN? Is so which one do you reccomend?

[Calavera]

I'm in need of a VPN and don't know a lot about them. I've looked at a few and Cyberghost or NordVPN seems alright. Cyberghost is a bit cheaper.

[pixel]

For my most unsavory downloads, I've been using BTGuard for at least a decade. I'm a simple man so I've been too lazy to switch, even with all the low review scores.

I guess which VPN you use depends on what you'll use it for. Myself? I don't need anything except to mask my IP address. BTGuard hasn't ever let me down on that very specific need, but other VPN providers blow it away with features. Even at $60/year, there are cheaper options abound, but I tell myself that I pay for dependability. (I should look for an alternative myself )

Private Internet Access worked well enough for the few days that I tested the service; but it's the large services (i.e. Amazon, Facebook) that made it an absolute chore to use network wide. I dreamt that I could filter all my web traffic at the router, but there were so many errors and CAPTCHAs and it was unusable.

[Skynet]

I've used the following:

PIA
Express VPN
Nord VPN (my current VPN)

In terms of how I'd rate them for my specific requirements, I'd probably say I preferred PIA and Express / Nord tied.

They all have basically the same features, but PIA let me use the VPN on more devices concurrently compared to Express (5) and Nord (6).

Something I personally like having is the ability to choose which apps the VPN is being used on. For example, there are some cases where I want the VPN to handle all traffic (either router or device level) or sometimes I'd prefer to just have say Chrome or torrent program running through VPN and everything else isn't through VPN, such as if I'm gaming. All the VPNs above do that, but in different ways. I prefer the way PIA does it, Nord is alright too but the split tunnel feature has been broken for ages so I'm running an older Nord version to achieve this. What makes it annoying is the constant "you need to update Nord" warnings I get because I'm running an old version.

A few points worth noting:

- I don't know if this is something you can do in the US or if you have access to similar, but when I bought 2 or 3 years of Nord I used a 90% cashback, so I got it for something like AU$17.

https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/668903 This isn't the one I used, but you get the idea.

- Also do some research on who owns these companies. I moved away from PIA because I think they're now owned by a company based in the US, which means if someone like the FBI were asking for customer info they'd need to provide it, I believe. I didn't realise Nord is now the same when I bought it, so that's something I'll check into later down the track. So do some research about what logs they keep (if any), what payment methods do they accept (some accept gift cards and whatnot), who is their parent company and where are they based.

- How many devices do you want to secure? Do you need to do this at router level or device level? If device, how many do you want to secure? If 10, Express and Nord will only do up to x amount concurrently. When I had PIA the limit was 10.

[Calavera]

How many devices do you want to secure? Do you need to do this at router level or device level? If device, how many do you want to secure? If 10, Express and Nord will only do up to x amount concurrently. When I had PIA the limit was 10.

Device level and really I'll only need it for 1 PC maybe 2 tops. I've been looking at different VPNS but there are so damn many it is hard to choose. Then when I think I've found a decent one that everybody loves I end up finding an article saying something bad about it. I just want to download in peace!

I'm seeing a lot of recommendations for one called Mullvad.

[Skynet]

How many devices do you want to secure? Do you need to do this at router level or device level? If device, how many do you want to secure? If 10, Express and Nord will only do up to x amount concurrently. When I had PIA the limit was 10.

Device level and really I'll only need it for 1 PC maybe 2 tops. I've been looking at different VPNS but there are so damn many it is hard to choose. Then when I think I've found a decent one that everybody loves I end up finding an article saying something bad about it. I just want to download in peace!

I'm seeing a lot of recommendations for one called Mullvad.

I was going to try Mullvad but after some research it wasn't for me, I can't remember why. I think Surfshark is my next one I was going to look into once my account expires.

[melancholy]

I once upon a time used PIA. I don’t think it does now, but back when I was using it, it would assign you a IP from a pool of IP addresses that everyone used. It’s purpose was to better hide your traffic, because if multiple people are using the same address, it’s harder to trace who was doing what. But the downside was that websites commonly blocked those IPs so there was a lot of sites I couldn’t even visit while it was on.

Eventually I got fed up with so many websites blocking my VPN, so I switched to Nord 4 years ago and have been using it ever since.

[Calavera]

Eventually I got fed up with so many websites blocking my VPN, so I switched to Nord 4 years ago and have been using it ever since.

I'm kind of leaning towards Nord atm. I've looked into it and it seems to have a lot of good features and apparently works very will with Qbittorrent which is what I use. If I go with Nord I'll most likely go with the 2 year plan as it is the cheapest in the long run. My main use for it is torrenting obviously. I don't want to get any kind of notice from my ISP that they don't like what I'm downloading. If Nord will for sure do that then it seems like that is the one I should get.

[Skynet]

Eventually I got fed up with so many websites blocking my VPN, so I switched to Nord 4 years ago and have been using it ever since.

I'm kind of leaning towards Nord atm. I've looked into it and it seems to have a lot of good features and apparently works very will with Qbittorrent which is what I use. If I go with Nord I'll most likely go with the 2 year plan as it is the cheapest in the long run. My main use for it is torrenting obviously. I don't want to get any kind of notice from my ISP that they don't like what I'm downloading. If Nord will for sure do that then it seems like that is the one I should get.

I use qbittorrent exclusively and never had issues with it. I got one of those notices years back when I first got broadband for downloading King Kong My ISP at the time did not give a shit about protecting their customers so are all "here's their information" and I got email directly from the studio lmao. Then I moved to another ISP who protected customer rights. I then got a job with said ISP and my original ISP then bought my employer/ISP and I made sure I always had a VPN at that point.

[pixel]

I use qbittorrent exclusively and never had issues with it. I got one of those notices years back when I first got broadband for downloading King Kong My ISP at the time did not give a shit about protecting their customers so are all "here's their information" and I got email directly from the studio lmao. Then I moved to another ISP who protected customer rights. I then got a job with said ISP and my original ISP then bought my employer/ISP and I made sure I always had a VPN at that point.

I was too lazy to get off the couch when I got my last notice. I didn't want to get the Back to the Future disc out, so I used my phone to download the movie and casted it to the TV.

Luckily, our local ISP gives two shits about DMCA notices. I got myself a year-long ban on another ISP back in the day for getting three strikes.

[Skynet]

I use qbittorrent exclusively and never had issues with it. I got one of those notices years back when I first got broadband for downloading King Kong My ISP at the time did not give a shit about protecting their customers so are all "here's their information" and I got email directly from the studio lmao. Then I moved to another ISP who protected customer rights. I then got a job with said ISP and my original ISP then bought my employer/ISP and I made sure I always had a VPN at that point.

I was too lazy to get off the couch when I got my last notice. I didn't want to get the Back to the Future disc out, so I used my phone to download the movie and casted it to the TV.

Luckily, our local ISP gives two shits about DMCA notices. I got myself a year-long ban on another ISP back in the day for getting three strikes.

Laws in Australia make it so there needs to be ISP level domain blocks in place. Based on stuff Hawq has posted, it sounds similar to UK. The best part is you don't even need a VPN to bypass it, you can just change to a different DNS

[Calavera]

Luckily, our local ISP gives two shits about DMCA notices. I got myself a year-long ban on another ISP back in the day for getting three strikes.

I'm not sure how it works with my ISP. They actually disabled the connection. When I called to see what was wrong they said I needed to check my email and that there would be a link in there to restore it. Sure enough there was an email titled "Possible copyright violation"

One part of the email says
"We have not verified the validity of the claim nor will we provide any information to the complainant without a court order. You are however requested to cease the sharing of and remove said content per the terms"

I don't check that email account very often so I looked back and saw there was another one from sometime back in April from another game. The exact same email the only difference was what I had downloaded. So I'm not sure why they suspended the connection for this one but not for the first one. To get it back on I just had to fill out a form that basically said I acknowledge the account was suspended for a possible copyright violation and I've read and understand the terms of service.

However it said that form can only be used and sent online for a first time violation. Apparently after that you have to mail something in or some shit. So I really don't know if they would cancel the service permanently or for a set amount of time if more came in. I obviously don't want to chance it which is why I 100 percent need a good VPN.

Funny thing is I had my previous ISP for around 16 years and never had a problem with what I downloaded. What is the point of having a super fast connection if I can't download whatever I want!

[Roofus]

I've used PIA, ProXPN and Surfshark. The only one I wouldn't recommend is ProXPN. It's slow as hell, doesn't have that many servers and the client is crap. At least it was. I only ever used it because they had a sale on lifetime subscriptions a few years ago.

[Calavera]

I've used PIA, ProXPN and Surfshark. The only one I wouldn't recommend is ProXPN. It's slow as hell, doesn't have that many servers and the client is crap. At least it was. I only ever used it because they had a sale on lifetime subscriptions a few years ago.

I decided on NordVPN. It seems pretty good. No slowdown at all, I tried a speed test and it is still the full 100mbps both up and down.

[Skynet]

I've used PIA, ProXPN and Surfshark. The only one I wouldn't recommend is ProXPN. It's slow as hell, doesn't have that many servers and the client is crap. At least it was. I only ever used it because they had a sale on lifetime subscriptions a few years ago.

I decided on NordVPN. It seems pretty good. No slowdown at all, I tried a speed test and it is still the full 100mbps both up and down.

If you ever have a need for split tunneling, you may just need to download an older version.

[Hawq]

No point starting up a new thread when this one deals with this, anyone use/used hide.me vpn?. Just installed the free version as the firefox extension for it which was going fine is being a bit crappy today, not sure if its just the trail of the full one thats making it go good atm or if it will still be good when it goes to the free version or for that matter if its worth just getting the full one or trying soething else, preferably good & free or at least good & affordable

[Skynet]

I haven't tried that, so I can't help, sorry.

Good timing on the bump, though. I'm just a couple months away from my 3 year Nord deal expiring. I don't know what to get next. All the ones people used to recommend have changed or the company was bought by another company or there have been raids for user data, etc.

I may just stick with Nord again. Last time I used a cashback to get multiple years really cheap, I might have to do the same again now.

[melancholy]

I still have Nord, but man it’s not as cheap as it used to be. I’m thinking of dropping it just to see if they offer me a better deal to stay.

[Skynet]

I still have Nord, but man it’s not as cheap as it used to be. I’m thinking of dropping it just to see if they offer me a better deal to stay.

I made the mistake of looking up something about Nord on reddit once. Now all I get is recommended posts from the Nord subreddit saying "Nord is ripping me off compared to previous years" or "the previous 3 year deals are now just 2" and such. I'm not expecting anything better, but I don't know who to switch to. I know Nord works on all the devices I use it on (Windows, Linux, Android) so I don't have to switch but I'm sure there's better value out there

[pixel]

This thread over on Lemmy has some good suggestions. Proton, Mullvad, iVPN among others.

[Roofus]

Luckily, our local ISP gives two shits about DMCA notices. I got myself a year-long ban on another ISP back in the day for getting three strikes.

I got my third strike last year. I had to call Spectrum and play the part of the clueless dad who had to promise to yell at the no-good kids for ruining my Saturday morning.

I switched to Usenet that day, haven't downloaded a torrent since and I've pirated more in the last year than I ever did before.

As for a VPN, I still have Surfshark, for all the good it did me.