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beep@piefed.world to Technology@lemmy.worldEnglish ·
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11 hours ago

Proton analyzed 7,000+ mobile VPN apps. 64 apps actively collect physical location via GPS or other geolocation, 3 are owned by market research firms, and 85% of them contain trackers.

protonvpn.com

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Proton analyzed 7,000+ mobile VPN apps. 64 apps actively collect physical location via GPS or other geolocation, 3 are owned by market research firms, and 85% of them contain trackers.

protonvpn.com

beep@piefed.world to Technology@lemmy.worldEnglish ·
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11 hours ago
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Shady VPNs could be spying on millions of Americans | Proton VPN
protonvpn.com
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A new survey of VPN apps available in the US shows that a worryingly large number of them behave in unacceptable ways.

cross-posted from: https://piefed.world/c/tech/p/1366113/proton-analyzed-7000-mobile-vpn-apps-64-apps-actively-collect-physical-location-via-gps

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  • perishthethought@piefed.social
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    3 hours ago

    This is the trackers and permission site referenced in the X posts

    https://reports.exodus-privacy.eu.org/en/

  • esc@piefed.social
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    10 hours ago

    No list, advert for proton.

    • beep@piefed.worldOP
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      9 hours ago

      Check my other comment.

      • esc@piefed.social
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        7 hours ago

        So no full list, just cropped screenshots? Why?

        • boatswain@infosec.pub
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          3 hours ago

          To avoid defamation lawsuits, most likely.

  • Babalugats@feddit.uk
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    12 hours ago

    Any chance of seeing the list broken down by ownership and trackers?

    It seems a bit pointless otherwise.

    • beep@piefed.worldOP
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      9 hours ago

      Source: David Peterson, Proton VPN General Manager.

      • artyom@piefed.social
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        4 hours ago

        Its a good thing they posted them on inaccessible Xitter in a confusing as fuck “thread” instead of their own God damn website…

      • Cris_Citrus (he/him <3)@piefed.zip
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        8 hours ago

        Its unfortunate they really only name and shame random shovelware vpns it looks like. So it feels difficult to tell whether their points apply to any other real options people have heard of before…

      • u/lukmly013 💾 (lemmy.sdf.org)@lemmy.sdf.org
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        8 hours ago

        Surely it’s too hard to upload a spreadsheet on the internet.

    • MolochHorridus@piefed.social
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      8 hours ago

      It’s an ad for Proton. Obviously.

    • Victor@lemmy.world
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      11 hours ago

      Not important, this is just a disguised advertisement for Proton VPN.

      • tb_@lemmy.world
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        11 hours ago

        Just because it is, doesn’t mean it can’t contain useful data.

        See also: https://www.mozillafoundation.org/en/blog/privacy-nightmare-on-wheels-every-car-brand-reviewed-by-mozilla-including-ford-volkswagen-and-toyota-flunks-privacy-test/

        • Victor@lemmy.world
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          10 hours ago

          I know lol, I was being facetious. 😉 I also want to see the list.

    • Th4tGuyII@fedia.io
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      11 hours ago

      Yeah, it would be nice to have an actual list so we’re not reliant on their numbers alone. But unfortunately telling only half the story is something Proton seems to do quite a lot.

      On the bright side, the actual privacy data for this was by Proton’s own admission from Exodus, so while its probably not feasible for you to skim 65K apps on your own, you can at least see the data for specific VPN apps you might be worried about.

      • CosmoNova@lemmy.world
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        10 hours ago

        They would probably get sued if they dropped names of direct competitors.

        • Th4tGuyII@fedia.io
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          9 hours ago

          Yeah true enough. Even if the data they’ve got was 100% accurate and easy to prove in court, they’d still be stuck having to pay out the arse for lawyers just to appear in court.

    • Zarobi@aussie.zone
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      11 hours ago

      They listed a few in their article, but yeah a full list would be nice.

      Three of the VPN services we looked at are actually owned by market research companies: ‎Phone Guardian Safe WiFi (Sensor Tower), My Mobile Secure VPN (Comscore), and Urban VPN (BiScience, which has been been shown to capture user conversations across several services and share them with AI chat platforms).


      In what many could reasonably see as the ultimate act of betrayal, 64 VPN apps actively track your physical location using GPS and other geolocation data. […] These apps include some of the most popular VPNs in the US, such as VPN Proxy Master, VPN-Fast VPN Super, and X-VPN

      • PineRune@lemmy.world
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        11 hours ago

        Those all sound like fake VPN apps that I wouldn’t trust anyway.

  • DigDoug@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    Given that Proton’s CEO has a massive boner for Trump, I don’t think they’re particularly worthy of my trust, either.

    • ∟⊔⊤∦∣≶@lemmy.nz
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      7 hours ago

      Source?

      • cenzorrll@piefed.ca
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        6 hours ago

        https://theintercept.com/2025/01/28/proton-mail-andy-yen-trump-republicans/

    • Paradoxeuh@jlai.lu
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      8 hours ago

      I heard that Mullvad’s cleaning lady is also voting for Trump…so here we are…

      • Sanguine@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        6 hours ago

        This minimizes what actually happened at mullvad. And OP is overblowing the proton trump thing as per usual in these comments.

        Its exhausting really.

  • oyzmo@piefed.social
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    8 hours ago

    Mullvad

    • perishthethought@piefed.social
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      3 hours ago

      … is not on the lists.

  • DigDoug@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago
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