NordVPN Responds to Privacy Sensitive Allegations

[ARMOUR]

Over the past several weeks there have been repeated efforts to place NordVPN is a bad light. The company is being linked to Tesonet, one of Lithuania's largest tech companies, which runs data mining and residential proxy services. NordVPN says that these activities have nothing to do with their company and have retained a large auditing firm to back this up.

The VPN industry is highly competitive. Combined with a userbase which tends to be more suspicious than the average Internet user, this is a volatile mix.

 

In recent weeks there have been a series of allegations lodged against NordVPN. The company is being linked to Lithuanian tech company Tesonet, which offers a wide range of services and products. According to the allegations, Tesonet owns NordVPN, a claim the latter denies.

 

This turns out to be problematic for some, as Tesonet is involved in data mining practices, and the company also runs a residential proxy network. While there is no evidence that NordVPN is involved in any of that, it’s enough to feed conspiracies.

 

The situation didn’t improve when Tesonet was sued by Luminati, the company behind the “not so private” VPN service Hola. The complaint accuses Tesonet of infringing Luminati’s proxy patents and NordVPN is listed is the suit as well, with the claim that it had a business relationship with Hola.

 

NordVPN initially opted not to comment publicly but that changed when a new storm of mostly ‘fake’ Twitter accounts (many of which were created years ago but have only tweeted on this particular issue) made themselves heard over the past days.

 

“We realized that remaining silent is no longer an option and we must respond for the sake of our reputation,” NordVPN wrote in a recent blog post.

 

NordVPN responds to several claims including that they are operating the same way as Hola, by selling users’ bandwidth. This is something anyone can verify independently, they say, by monitoring their traffic via a network monitoring application.

 

“Anyone with Wireshark (or any other similar app) and some networking knowledge can perform a network scan, check all requests made by the NordVPN application, and verify their destinations. The results will prove that the web scraping accusations are false,” the company writes.

 

 

Article Source:

• TorrentFreak.com
• NordVPN Blog

[jamesDDI]

@Myna 

[steven36]

I have Nord vpn but i never use it much anymore,  i use my other one mostly ...I use to use Nord all the time back a few years ago i never had much problems with them other than some of there servers was kind of slow, now i use  it only  when my main vpn  is blocked when watching TV shows from the UK ,AU and NZ  and the USA. Even though i'm from the  USA i never stream without a vpn. I dont like the fact it's over advertised TV commercials is a bit much , and i use and ip sniffer and i never seen nothing fishy going on with there servers ..I cant say the same about CyberGhost who uses cloudflare  in there vpn , sets tracking cookies, blocking p2p in some countries  and have too much adverts in there vpn client but i never had a problem with CyberGhost reporting anything to my isp but they seem very fishy .

[nir]

@steven36  Which VPN do you recommend?

[KXR75]

Stick with AirVPN as replacement CyberGhost, Instead of glancing at NordVPN (even I got license until 2010 lol)

Not face any issue while using AirVPN, better speed and a lot servers.

[steven36]

47 minutes ago, nir said:

@steven36  Which VPN do you recommend?

It depends on what OS you have  and how much you want to pay. only a few have Linux clients  when I use Nord in Linux i have to use it with open vpn  witch is nice because it don't effect my other VPN on Windows VPNs conflict with each other . AirVpn is a nice one for Linux full support .  Nord is really cheap they a poor mans vpn lol. You can't really trust vpn reviews as most people get a kick back for them . I don't like recommending vpns  because if something was to ever happen i could never forgive myself if i recommended one .I can tell you some i don't recommend ,there Hotspot Shield , IPVanish , Hide My Ass  , Pure VPN  and ExpressVPN .

 

ExpressVPN always get good reviews on vpn sites but numbers of people who bought it had bad luck so id never buy it based on no review. When it comes to VPNs  people are very biased there like use what  i use, but i try to just worry about, me, myself and I and  all i can tell you i never had no trouble from Nord they have 100s of severs to chose from if you get a slow server just change ips,  they very good for getting around geo blocks because they have lots of servers and there cheap . The reason i dont  recommend Hotspot Shield it's adware  and most the others i dont recommend  have turned people in. If they dont narc no one out or been proven to be adware  i cant really debate them now can I?

[steven36]

Further more them using a trusted independent auditor the set the record right will most likely prove that they a legit company you can trust, that can back up what they say witch is hard to find in a vpn now days. If i was running a crooked  company that sold peoples data and i was based in Panama were i did not have to comply  with rest of the worlds laws, i sure would  not be volunteering to be audited by a  independent auditor. That's great transparency and it will be interesting to read. if they have any logs they will be found. Only reason companies in USA  are audited because it's the law  and they most of the time get wrote up for a bunch of stuff they have to fix are they get closed down.

Quote

 

NordVPN promises independent security audit amid data mining allegations

 

Popular VPN provider NordVPN has issued a stringent denial of claims, which have been circulating online, that the company has been involved in data mining. They have even gone so far as to commission an independent security audit to try and prove the claims to be false.

The Tesonet link

The claims have emerged as a result of a copyright infringement lawsuit which appears to link a company called Tesonet with Luminati, the owner of Hola VPN.

Hola VPN is a free VPN service which was found to be selling users’ excess bandwidth. They were doing this through a Lithuanian proxy service operated by a company called Tesonet.

The copyright lawsuit suggests that Tesonet has been using this technology elsewhere, in breach of Luminati’s copyright. And crucially, the lawsuit names NordVPN and even implies that Tesonet is the real parent company of NordVPN.

Were this to be the case, the possible implications for NordVPN’s service and its reputation could be significant. Since the lawsuit came to light, rumour and conjecture have abounded, much of which appears to have been spread, rather maliciously, by rival VPN services.

But NordVPN has come out fighting, issuing a strong statement in which they condemn these rivals for their underhand tactics, firmly deny the accusations levelled against them, and set out how they intend to prove the allegations false.

Firstly, NordVPN begin by explaining the nature of their relationship with Tesonet. They explain that Tesonet is a big tech player in Lithuania. While they acknowledge that Tesonet does offer a data mining service, they insist that this is just one of many services they provide and not one that NordVPN uses.

In response to allegations that NordVPN is, in fact, owned by Tesonet, there is a flat-out denial. This is important because if that claim were true, the assertions that NordVPN is based offshore in Panama would be false.

NordVPN insists that Tesonet is not their owner, merely a service provider and that they are, and have always been, operating under the laws of Panama.

NordVPN’s Security Audit plans

And what’s more, NordVPN say they can prove this too. According to them, anyone who uses Wireshark can perform a network scan which will analyse all of the requests that the NordVPN app is making. This, they claim, will prove that allegations that NordVPN is selling excess bandwidth in the same way as Hola VPN, is wholly false.

However, they acknowledge that this may not be enough for some. So, they have gone even further. In their statement, they confirm that they have hired the services of one of the world’s biggest professional service firms to run an independent audit and verify this and their no user logs claim.

They will not be the first VPN to carry out such an audit. Tunnelbear conducted a similar one last year. But they are probably the biggest provider to undertake such an audit so far, and it is certainly a statement of intent from them.

The Hola VPN link explained

NordVPN’s statement also seeks to clarify the extent of their relationship with Hola VPN. There have been some insinuations that there might be a business relationship between the two, with the implications that NordVPN is involved in “a data mining conglomerate.”

They insist that the only link between the two companies is that Hola VPN was one of NordVPN’s many affiliate partners and, when customers left Hola VPN, they would be referred to NordVPN, with the latter paying a small commission if they signed up.

There is no reason to doubt the voracity of NordVPN’s claims at the moment. There is certainly no proof that they are guilty of any of the allegations which have been levelled against them at the moment.

But, as things stand, NordVPN cannot categorically prove their innocence at this point either. They have laid out how they intend to do so, but that process will take time and, for the moment at least, their reputation has taken a bit of a hit.

Insufficient proof… for now

Our view is that, for the time being, there is not sufficient evidence for existing NordVPN customers to be unduly concerned. While the relationship between NordVPN and Tesonet is unfortunate, there is no proof that any wrongdoing has taken place.

However, we do reserve the right to change this stance depending on the emergence of future evidence. The results of the Independent Security Review into NordVPN’s service will make for extremely interesting reading, as will any further revelations that emerge from the copyright infringement trial in the USA.

But the strength of NordVPN’s denials and the lack of evidence to prove the case against them is sufficient, for now at least, for us to take the line that their service can still be trusted. NordVPN is innocent until proven guilty, and such proof is certainly not available at the moment.

 

 

https://www.vpncompare.co.uk/nordvpn-security-audit-data-mining-allegations/

[Dukun Cabul]

 

Source:

https://nordvpn.com/about-us/

[Myna]

3 hours ago, jamesDDI said:

@Myna 

I see what you did there. Lol... 

I've actually read the blog post earlier. And I still stand by what I said in the past. There's not enough proof to say outright that NordVPN is data mining. And the connection that they have with Tesonet can be easily explained. 

Anyways, now that they're ready to be audited, it says a lot. It'll only catapult their fame, in case nothing fishy comes out in the reports. 

[steven36]

I see them darn troll bots on twitter posting about this most likely belong to Hola vpn  that turns your PC into a botnet ...So much for them cleaning that website up it still full of fake accounts.

 

https://twitter.com/selinewr81m81k

 

 

I brb going to boot in linux and  test Nord's new linux app...

[jamesDDI]

1 hour ago, Myna said:

I see what you did there. Lol... 

 

 

What? Where?

[c0vert]

6 hours ago, steven36 said:

I brb going to boot in linux and  test Nord's new linux app...

I run Linux 24/7 and just tried the Nord app. It's... ehh... OK.  At first it connected to me a country that's not even remotely close. Had to disconnect and then reconnect and it finally connected to a server within my country.

 

As far as commands go, it's a bit... limited. Severely limited. When comparing it to Private Internet Access' Linux app, this 'app' is miles behind the curve. Taking a look at the attached images will showcase the obvious app differences.

 

P.I.A Settings:

 

P.I.A Connection notification:

 

NordVPN CLI only:

 

In terms of speed, I've noticed that some of the VPN providers license the same/similar servers from the same exact companies, so no difference there.

[steven36]

2 hours ago, c0vert said:

I run Linux 24/7 and just tried the Nord app. It's... ehh... OK.  At first it connected to me a country that's not even remotely close. Had to disconnect and then reconnect and it finally connected to a server within my country.

 

As far as commands go, it's a bit... limited. Severely limited. When comparing it to Private Internet Access' Linux app, this 'app' is miles behind the curve. Taking a look at the attached images will showcase the obvious app differences.

 

P.I.A Settings:

 

P.I.A Connection notification:

 

NordVPN CLI only:

In terms of speed, I've noticed that some of the VPN providers license the same/similar servers from the same exact companies, so no difference there.

The only way to be able to chose your own servers with Nord on Linux is use the Open VPN  method instead .. Maybe they will  change this in a update  right now the Linux Client is like PIA  is it dont let you pick the server only it let you pick the country.   you to have set each server up with Open VPN to have every server  . The windows client for Nord let you pick you're own server  witch PIA's wont  and the companies are not all the same. Nord has many more servers than PIA does . .PIA is pot luck you connect to a country and it gives the server it wants ..Nord is not like this if you use open vpn on Linux or  the windows client it let you pick every sever they have. I think its pretty good for a 1st release because before all they had was Open VPN but it's too much like a CLI version of PIA..

 

Nord has 4869 servers · 62 countries you can pick using open vpn on Linux  or open vpn or windows client on windows.

https://nordvpn.com/servers/

 

PIA  have   3791 VPN and Proxy servers in 53 locations across 33 countries. and they always pick the server they thinks best for you.

https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/pages/network/

 

They both cost around the same witch makes Nord a better deal .Just PIA has a nicer client for Linux  . But NORD have a good one for windows.

 

On Linux it dont matter you can  have PIA Linux Client  , Nord Linux Client and Nord Open VPN all set up on the same OS they want conflict with other because unlike windows they all use the same tap  and wont try to overwrite  each other,

 

PS: to connect to Italy  you  when connect to Nord VPN  client  you have to put in the  terminal

nordvpn connect Italy

 

they have 53 servers for Italy.

 

When your dealing with Geo blocked streams you want to be able to pick you're own servers  some of them  will work  and some want .. And Nord have Working servers for most everything , you just have to find them. For torrents , direct  downloads or not protected streaming  or YouTube  it don't really matter as long as its a server that allow p2p.. You can look at the link for nord i gave you and see what countries they allow  p2p on  its a whole lot of them more than CyberGhost had for P2P.

 

 

[straycat19]

@steven36 @c0vert Have you tried running PIA using their extension for chrome browser on a linux system.  I use it occasionally on Windows and it works fine.  I don't use chrome in linux so I have never tried it.  

 

[steven36]

5 hours ago, straycat19 said:

I don't use chrome in linux so I have never tried it.   

I dont use Chrome in any OS,   in Linux you can use  Open Source Chromium witch is the default browser that come in some Distros  and will work for most  any  Chrome extension .  With the recent changes to Firefox it's no better than Open Source Chromium . The web extensions for Chromium based browsers have been around longer,  so there less buggy. My Distro only comes with Open Source Chromium and i don't install Firefox  because it  don't  have support  for the addon i need to use all my download mangers, so i install Waterfox instead , so i can use flashgot to intergrade all my download mangers in  Waterfox ..  So I just install Waterfox witch work with legacy addons also Palemoon work for Flashgot,  .

 

But to answer your question I've never tired PIA extension but most all vpn extensions  from Google Store  work just fine in Google Chrome or Open Source Chromium in. Linux I've tested Zenmate  extension and it works good . Normally i don't use browser vpns because they make you have a different ip in your browser than in your system witch will cause some downloads not to work in download mangers. But  i sometimes turn on a browser vpn  to see if a website is blocking my system wide vpn . But Zenmate extension is better than PIA because they have one for Firefox too and they are  like the ones who invented browser vpns even  .

 

I only use Firefox in Windows  because its very fast on Windows on Linux Waterfox is  faster than it is on Windows  so really they no benefit for me to use Firefox on Linux . Most all apps are faster on Linux than they are Windows .More apps that are faster is Gimp and Kodi that i use. People go out and pay for extra ram to use on windows to do task that you can do on Linux with half the ram you need on Windows .Most of the reason most people use windows is all marketing  ..With a strong market comes lots of Software DEVs  you don't really use and OS you use software .

 

Over the years windows have lost some of it to IOS and Android  because they have a strong app market as well . Android witch is a version of Linux for now has a stronger market  than Windows , you can buy and Android phone cheaper than a PC. You can buy  a Android TV Box cheap and stream 4k were you would need a high end PC to do it on Windows. Even though Windows is more private than Googles OSes it dont matter because most people choice convenience and less expensive  over privacy every time. Many Linux users are Google fanboys they traders to the open source cause . Google are the reason Windows became less private they done it to compete with Android and still they lost the smart phone wars. Heck some big wigs that work for the Linux Foundation be using Mac OS instead of Linux because they are just in it for the money part of Linux .  

 

FOSS and the Linux Kernel  are two different things .. Linux Kernel  witch is open source is used in open source and closed source  to power lots of devices .

 

Thats why I use Ubuntu they have more software than any open source distro, for Linux to be usable to everyone we must port most closed source apps to Linux  as well and leave it up to the end user to decide if they want too be Google fanboys , Facebook junkies or whatever. Linux distros is a whole lot more lenient with browser and other apps  privacy than privacy advocates are because   the Linux Community has do whats is  in the interest of all its users not just some of them.

[EternalPurple]

Found this article earlier, I thought it was interesting: https://www.comparitech.com/blog/vpn-privacy/nord-vpn-botnet/. In other words, Nord isn't running a botnet, like some other providers, khm.

[EternalPurple]

Guys, get some popcorn. I’ll just leave this here: https://medium.com/@derekjohanson_17934/the-dark-side-of-the-vpn-industry-a-different-look-into-the-nordvpn-data-mining-claims-c71082c53dcb This is getting interesting.