Realized my VPN was leaking data for 6 months after a reddit thread tipped me off

I was at a coffee shop in Portland last Tuesday messing around on my laptop when someone on r/privacy mentioned checking DNS leaks. Ran a test on three different sites and sure enough my real IP was visible on all of them. I had been trusting this cheap VPN I got for $3 a month from a random ad and never questioned it. Anybody else catch a leak they didn't expect or am I the only one who was that clueless?

3 comments

3 Comments

johnthompson11d ago

Saw a Wirecutter piece saying free VPNs leak way more often than paid ones.

river_scott7d agoTop Commenter

Haven't they been caught taking money from companies that sell user data too though? Even some "no-log" paid ones got busted keeping logs. Free ones are definitely shadier on average, I'll give you that. But I've seen tests where a couple free options held up better than some big name paid ones. Depends more on the specific company than the price tag.

abbyc3311d ago

isn't that just cause paid ones want your money too @johnthompson?