Post #3988469

2026-07-21 14:40 UTC

It has always made me uncomfortable when privacy projects align themselves with VPNs. VPNs are, at best, a tool for rerouting traffic. There are a few good reasons for choosing to reroute traffic but none of those reasons are about privacy. And all of those reasons are predicated on an ability to trust the new provider *more* than the default/another. I'm skeptical of that trust in the best cases, I have no idea how it can be justified when/after a provider actively supports authoritarianism.

Replies (8)

@frumble@chaos.social 2026-07-21 15:08

@sarahjamielewis@mastodon.social It also baffles me to see a sad deactivated big VPN button in new #Firefox profiles, like as you would absolutely need to start the VPN service now to be protected, somehow.

Open ##3989365
@ChrisFerguson@mastodon.social 2026-07-21 15:19

@sarahjamielewis@mastodon.social yeah, it's not an increase in privacy, it's a rerouting of trust with data. Still, I understand why the two are often conflated. People are desperate to control their data, and VPNs return SOME control over how it flows, but, crucially as you point out, not an increase in the level of privacy of that data inherently. It's about trust management. And yeah, a provider needs to display trustworthy values. Supporting authoritarianism isn't it!

Open ##3989373
@paulywill@mstdn.ca 2026-07-21 16:38

@sarahjamielewis@mastodon.social VPNs can also ensure the traffic is encrypted and vetted on highly controlled networks. This is common for most corporations and government agencies. The same tools should be available to anyone.

Open ##3990477
@b0rk@social.jvns.ca 2026-07-21 14:57

@sarahjamielewis@mastodon.social I mostly hear about people using VPNs to do bittorrent, I guess the idea being that the VPN provider is headquartered in another country and that the local authorities won't be motivated (or wouldn't be able to?) approach them to find out who is torrenting copyrighted material I don't know if that's "privacy" exactly but it doesn't feel totally unrelated to privacy. maybe I don't know what privacy is!

Open ##3990538
@sarahjamielewis@mastodon.social 2026-07-21 17:04

To respond to a lot of replies at once - the terms "privacy", "security", "censorship", "trust", "encrypted", "anonymity", "jurisdictional flexibility", and "deniability" while all sharing related domains are all technically describing very different properties. My work and research depend on being able to treat these properties separately, and understand each in isolation (and warning that it is important to not conflate them with each other)

Open ##3991267
@raymaccarthy@mastodon.ie 2026-07-21 16:59

@sarahjamielewis@mastodon.social The only private secure VPNs are ones with the server/endpoint in your own home or office. Those allow secure use of public WiFi etc. The 3rd party ones are not about security or privacy, they are a service to evade geo-restrictions. The big issue on age limited access is nothing to do with VPNs, because it has zero affect on services or VPNs provided from your own office or home, but loss of privacy for everyone accessing public services / websites.

Open ##3992036
@imclaren@infosec.exchange 2026-07-23 02:17

@sarahjamielewis@mastodon.social this is an interesting take but perhaps a little blunt? Routing around censorship, or in other words preventing censors from knowing what people are doing, is a form of privacy. The trade off is trusting the vpn provider.

Open ##4024615
@fazalmajid@social.vivaldi.net 2026-07-21 14:56

@sarahjamielewis@mastodon.social there’s a reason why the Privacy subreddit bans discussion of VPNs.

Open ##4038744