However, TOR slows your internet speed, sometimes rather considerably. And that’s especially true if you use it on top of a VPN. In a world were true online anonymity is still an unattainable dream, The Onion Router (TOR) helps bring you as close as possible. Unfortunately, just like their kill switch, it doesn’t always work. PureVPN does have a DNS leak protection feature. Without DNS leak protection in place, your ISP is going to know which sites you’re visiting, which kind of negates the point of using a VPN in the first place.Īnd if you’re in a country like China, a DNS leak can be very, very dangerous. Simply put, the Domain Name Service (DNS) is how your device and the servers know what you’re looking for when you type a site name into the search bar. Plus, it’s still in beta testing and prone to issues.Īnother very important security feature is DNS Leak Protection. Unfortunately, it’s only available for Windows, Android, and Android TV clients, which leaves a lot of customers high and dry. It’s incredibly useful if you’re a heavy VPN user, so we’re glad to see PureVPN has one. The Split Tunneling feature lets you create exceptions by telling PureVPN which apps you don’t want to have running via their servers. And that’s how you get your personal IP address leaked. And there’s no way to get around doing so.Įven worse, it doesn’t always work. Unfortunately, PureVPN forces users to give them administration rights to your computer before you can activate their kill switch. In our opinion, it should always be on by default and never switched off. The Internet Kill Switch is exactly what it sounds like: a feature that kills your internet connection if your device stops communicating with the VPN server, even if it’s only for a split second. We’ll briefly introduce both of them here. Some of the most important security features on a VPN include the kill switch and split tunneling capabilities. Kill Switch, Split Tunneling, and DNS Leak “Protection” You could also use PPTP, but we never recommend doing so due to its many vulnerabilities and poor encryption standards. In a nutshell though, PureVPN uses OpenVPN (both UDP and TCP), which is what we recommend if you’re not very familiar with this technology.įor those of you a little more tech-savvy, you can also choose from L2TP/IPSec, IKEv2, and SSTP. This is a little trickier to explain, so we recommend you take a look at our Beginner’s Guide to VPN Protocols when you get a chance. PureVPN pairs that encryption standard with the best VPN protocols currently available. Quite frankly, it’s virtually impossible to crack. When it comes to encryption, PureVPN follows the industry norm by using military-grade 256-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). Military-Grade Encryption and the Best VPN Protocols But the fact remains: despite the Altius IT audit, PureVPN’s privacy policy is still concerning and, frankly, self-explanatory.įor this reason, we’re not willing to give them the benefit of the doubt just yet. We’d like to be as trusting (or as gullible?) as other VPN comparison sites. The only difference is your original IP address is supposedly no longer recorded.Īs for bandwidth? PureVPN is still recording that too. PureVPN claims not to keep any connection logs, yet there’s a section on the type of information kept in the connection logs they record.Īnd it’s exactly the same information too – your connection dates, which PureVPN server location you’re connecting to, and who your ISP is. Here’s the introduction and part of the contents list: In 2018, PureVPN published a brand new Privacy Policy. And, as we mentioned earlier, those logs were used to help the FBI implicate user activity by cross-referencing them with third party user logs. The first paragraph of their privacy policy used to start with: “We do not monitor user activity nor do we keep any logs.”īut the second last sentence of that same paragraph began with: “Connection and bandwidth are kept in record…” Previously, PureVPN used to claim they were a zero-logs VPN. To be fair, China’s draconian privacy laws don’t extend to Hong Kong, which takes a relatively favorable stance.īut Hong Kong’s government is well-known for surveillance and privacy issues, and China has been trying to gain more control over the territory.Īll this puts us on guard even more than usual and makes us want to err on the side of caution by considering Hong Kong a jurisdiction almost as bad as a 5 Eyes country. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it’s not exactly a good thing either.Įven though Hong Kong isn’t a 5 Eyes, 9 Eyes, or 14 Eyes jurisdiction itself, they are technically a Chinese territory.
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