VPN Provider

[ChaLeeBoy]

Unfortunately, the laws presently being enacted by the UK Govt are mostly generated by the EU so are prevelant in all EU countries with the UK presently being one of the less regulated options. Germany is probably the most regulated of the EU countries (the Germans tend to implement all EU laws to the letter and beyond). France and Italy are also quite regulated but they tend to ignore EU laws most of the time unless it suites them. Ireland is also now heavily regulated. The only EU country that now makes any noise about 'privacy' is Holland.

Regardless of what they say, any VPN operator that has their offices within the US or EU keep logs far longer than 3 days. When they mention 3 days what they tend to mean is no full conversation log is kept more than 3 days (there's actually no good reason for them to have this log anyway except for snooping). Actual connection logs (which say which IP connected to what and for how long) have to be kept for a minimum of 3 years - thats the law !

VPN operators outside US/EU juristiction also tend to keep connection logs for a minimum period of 3 months just so they can run their business. If no logs were kept then they would find billing and other routine management difficult !

Also bear in mind the last hop of any vpn servce (the one from the vpn provider to the destination IP) is, by necessity, unencrypted. This fact allows anyone monitoring a vpn to relatively easily monitor what the vpn clients are actually doing. Statistical analyis of vpn service inputs/outputs is a fairly common tool used in intelligence gathering and can give the monitoring party almost total access to unencrypted data from what most would assume to be an encrypted datastream.

The VPN I use assured me that the only logs they keep were kept only 3 days max, and only then for troubleshooting.

I think it says as much on the HideIPVpn site if I remember right.

What information do you store?


We do not store any information except connection logs for 3 days for troubleshooting.

Source

Can't say for sure if that is Kosher though, can anyone be sure?

Do you reckon the Tories will get this information collection legislation through? I have my doubts. As far as I am aware the data to be held is only the connection logs, if you can believe that.

I am not the paranoid type, and I wouldn't think the state machine would be interested in some middle aged Grandpa blowing off hot air about politics and sat TV. (Me)

We don't live under a Marxian totalitarian regime, not just yet anyway.

Let's say, for example, I make a VOIP call using my VPN to tunnel the traffic. I thought my data would be safe from here to the VPN server (Germany) then wide open (unencrypted) to the VOIP provider (Switzerland) and open to the receiver, unless he was using a VPN too.

So if you are right about everything you have said, what is our best option? For privacy or mere nuisance value.

[TheCoder]

The VPN I use assured me that the only logs they keep were kept only 3 days max, and only then for troubleshooting.

They almost certainly mean full conversation logs, which they actually dont need to be taking at all but which most vpn providers operating in the EU now do so (for legal reasons). The quote "We do not store any information except connection logs for 3 days for troubleshooting." I suspect is designed to be deliberatelly misleading as it can be interpreted a number of ways !

Connection logs are something very different, these are details of your originating IP and which VPN IP was leased to you and for how long. These logs are required for the vpn to properly operate and will be kept at least as long as the billing period. Without these logs the vpn service could not properly handle billing. Most VPN providers simply call this 'billing' information in the hope you'll believe the blurb that they aren't logging. The truth is that if they operate within the EU then they are legally obliged to keep sufficient information to enable a client back-trace for a period of not less than 3 years !

[Bann32]

Well you certainly know your stuff, when did it change though because I read this some time ago, but thought I would add the link here as its relevant, or are they just talking shit?

 http://torrentfreak.com/which-vpn-providers-really-take-anonymity-seriously-111007/