Hi! So I have had surfshark for a while and been generally quite satisfied. They do everything I need them to do this far with no fuss and bundle in some handy other services as well.
My annual plan expires in a couple of months and I’m curious what else is out there, as I only started SF because it was heavily discounted at the time. From a new provider, I just need privacy, the ability to torrent totally public domain content, and a static IP. Do you have any suggestions for other options worth considering? I just like to have options. Thanks in advance!
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I self host, it’s way more convenient (opinion) and I don’t really care about anonymity. Also less expensive.
"I’m setting up a self-hosted server. Is VPNHouse suitable for this?
Yes, VPNHouse is great for self-hosted setups, you can use their open-code on the Github. It offers strong security and reliable connections
AirVPN. They let you port forward up to 20 ports, which is useful for various use cases (not just file sharing). If you want to seed torrents, port forwarding is an essential feature.
20 for old users, I think for new users there’s a new limite: 5 ports. Anyway, still very good.
I use my home router as a VPN server.
None, linode vps near my 5G upstream, running a wireguard node. Pihole + unbound, nginx and local DNS ftw. Route all traffic through the vps wireguard tunnel. YMMV, I’m rural so this setup works best for me.
Quectel 5G modem with 4x CA, waveform 4x mimo antenna on 30 foot pole, pointed at tower with best signal, calyx sim card, UDM-SE + 6E Enterprise AP. Started out as a way to escape CGNAT, and port forward / bypass video bandwidth throttle on T-Mobile network, progressed into a unifi obsession / homelab.
Nice. I used linode years ago to host a vpn server, worked well. I’m in a city though, so I was able to find a local high speed vpn service.
Thanks for sharing your rig setup, I can dig it.
I’ve been using PIA for a good few years now, never had a problem with them, slightly concernced that I appear to be pretty much the only one, does everyone else know something I don’t?
I switched to PIA very recently after my Nord subscription ended. Also Nord doesn’t support port forwarding and I wanted to improve my seeding. But PIA has been a disappointment. Using their app on my Win11 desktop, I often see messages on Reddit and elsewhere that I’ve never seen before about “no internet”. It also seems like responses are delayed and sometimes my screen just remains blank after clicking on a link. I’ve never experienced any of that before switching to PIA. And perhaps the biggest gripe, I intended to use PIA with Wireguard on my NAS but after much searching, I cannot find anywhere that PIA releases their WG keys. So I can use WG on my Win11 app but not on the NAS. Oh, and port forwarding? Yeah, apparently that has to be ‘renewed’ periodically so that too, is a PITA on the NAS. Luckily I’m still within the 30 day refund window, just have to figure out where to go next. Maybe AirVPN. In fact, that would be a no-brainer for me except for one thing – Air doesn’t have a server in Mexico and I do need that occasionally. PIA has one that’s incredibly slow but at least they have one.
They were acquired by some VPN megacorp and AFAIK, all their credible postings and court stuff happened prior to that, so their credibility is unknown today
AirVPN since about 8 years. Highly recommended. If you want something flashy that wins design awards looks elsewhere :) from a technical perspective they are absolutely top notch with every feature you could possibly wish for.
I use IVPN, paid for with crypto over Tor. It’s been amazing so far, but to make things easier I’ve taken to deploying my own “proxy” to it in the cloud (I cache DNS among other things).
Njalla works very well for me since the time it was (unfortunately) called ipredator
I host my own VPN. All I need when I am out and about.
When you torrent totally public domain stuff you most likely want a VPN with enough privacy to not give your IP to authorities. I can’t see that point if you run a VPN on a machine somewhere in the cloud which has your name registered to it.
I do only torrent stuff that won’t warrant the authorities to come to my home. This is in the end r/selfhosted and not r/piracy where you would have more concerns. Also your name is registered to the VPN service too and believe me they will rat you out if it comes to a how down with authorities.
If you truly care about privacy, you can go for a provider that asks for no personal details (not even an email if you so desire) and allows you to pay using an anonymous payment method such as Monero. In this scenario it would be incredibly difficult for Mullvad to rat you out even if they wanted to, assuming you only used the VPN for anything but things that could trace back to you (so no logging into services with firstname.lastname@gmail.com.) True privacy and anonymity is difficult to achieve but it is possible, just requires you to pay attention.
True anonymity and privacy is only offline possible.
If you ignored everything that was just said then yeah, sure. Wonder why Tor exists… Ah well, must be just for show.
Keep dreaming little one. You leave traces as soon as you go online even when using Tor and supposedly no logging VPN. In a way those have to log something about you for billing reasons alone.
Your anonymous login data and a “paid until date X” are literally all fields that are necessary for them to have it work. And even if someone can make the connection they can only see that you are using a VPN, not what for because the company doesn’t keep logs about your activity (and besides that doesn’t even have to hand them out). But keep saying “offline is more secure”. Yeah, d’uh, then please do us a favor and stay there.
Tor has been used to track and arrest people before. It isn’t 100% guaranteed like being offline is.
That is true, but very often when people have been caught like that, it didn’t have anything to do with Tor but just poor opsec, like literally using an email with your full name which kind of makes using Tor pointless anyway. If you can link me any events where people were caught any other way than the perpetrator not exercising good opsec, I’d love to take a look.
The question still included this requirement, so don’t suggest solutions that are not applicable then. Good VPN providers offer to pay with various services not linked to your personal data for a reason and they don’t sit in countries like the US. Please just stop spreading information about things you clearly have no clue about.
A this is r/selfhosted and there for the solution is to self host.
I use NordVPN, audited no-logs and they have static IPs to buy
I have several VPSes around the world each with OpenVPN.
I use protonvpn due to me getting it with my proton unlimited bundle, and on the plus side with some scripting I can use the proton NAT-PMP forwarding with my qbittorent to get port forwarding while… distributing and acquiring Linux isos.
No one for iVPN?
The creators of the DNS Leak check website.
Any on this page https://www.privacytools.io/privacy-vpn
PrivacyTools should be taken with a grain of salt these days. There was apparently a massive falling out.
Long story short the main guy went MIA and the rest of the crew and community decided over many months to create a new site since the main guy had the keys to the kingdom. Shortly after the move the guy came back and accused everyone of being against him. It’s a whole drama thing. But the fact that PrivacyTools now highly recommends NordVPN and ExpressVPN tells me all I need to know and I’m sticking with the new PrivacyGuides
