[HN Gopher] The ownership and future of Mullvad VPN
___________________________________________________________________
The ownership and future of Mullvad VPN
Author : JoachimS
Score : 467 points
Date : 2021-09-16 14:06 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (mullvad.net)
(TXT) w3m dump (mullvad.net)
| fabianhjr wrote:
| > [..] is consistent, long-term, and value-based ownership [..]
| this disqualifies taking outside investment, either through
| venture capital or going public.
|
| They should switch to a cooperative co-owned by workers and
| customers then. It the easiest legal-entity way of ensuring that
| continuity. (Coops cannot "take outside investment" nor "go
| public"; Mullvad would be owned by stakeholders rather than
| shareholders)
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| I wonder if they have the Benefit Corporation designation in
| Sweden?
| JoachimS wrote:
| Yes, in Sweden you have a number of legal constructs to use.
|
| You can organize a company as a cooperation. It is not a
| specific legal form of business, but a version of a normal
| limited company. It is used for non-profit businesses, for
| example a day care.
|
| You can also form a business association - which is fairly
| common for non-profit organizations. Typically house owners
| that share a road, have a small pier for their boats etc.
|
| Finally you can create a foundation. The foundation has no
| owners or members, but has a board. It is typically used to
| manage wealth, often for charity purposes (which I think
| matches the term used in the U.S.). The most famous
| foundation in Sweden is probably IKEA[0].
|
| (INAL etc. And [0] yes, I know that the IKEA HQ is in
| Switzerland, with foundation operations in Holland IRRC. But
| it was founded in Sweden - and we get mixed up with
| Switzerland all the time anyway so... ;-)
| nbzso wrote:
| Honestly, in the moment in which using VPN is outlawed for
| "whatever <insert societal manufactured consent> reason" I am
| shutting the Internet down and moving into the woods.
|
| Mullvad VPN is the first thing that I setup on every Internet
| connected device that I own.
| Trias11 wrote:
| On a side note - I think lots of popular, easy to use VPN
| services with good reviews are actually owned or fully controlled
| by 3-letter agencies or by group of "eyes".
|
| IMHO better pick lesser-known, obscure service for higher safety.
| If you care of course.
| mdb333 wrote:
| Curious what was the impetus for this statement? Rumors about
| selling out or something else?
| mdb333 wrote:
| NM... presume it's due to the news re: ExpressVPN --> Kape
| hnrj95 wrote:
| mullvad is absolutely excellent. they've definitely stuck to
| their guns, too
| Arubis wrote:
| Mullvad has been at the top of my mentally-disorganized pile of
| VPN trust for years. However, being the best and growing in
| popularity will eventually be a liability, if it isn't already:
| the more mindshare, popularity, and traffic, the more appealing
| they become as a target.
| DavideNL wrote:
| I tried them a few years ago on my iPhone and had issues with
| connectivity when using it as "always on" VPN. Often lost
| internet access (i think mostly when 'switching' between 3G and
| Wifi.) So i left them, for ProtonVpn, which has been working
| great.
|
| Does anyone use Mullvad on their mobile, has stability of the
| connection improved? (speed is not my first priority.)
|
| EDIT: why downvotes (without leaving a comment...) ?
| nsomaru wrote:
| With openvpn on iOS and mullvad, they don't clear your session
| immediately when you disconnect so it's easy to eat up all your
| "devices" and then be stuck without VPN ("too many device")
| until their cache clears.
|
| Anyone have a solution for always on mobile VPN using mullvad?
| RealStickman_ wrote:
| If you can, maybe try wireguard? I have not had any issues
| with that on my devices roaming between different networks.
|
| I don't use their app though, but the actual Wireguard config
| files.
| betwixthewires wrote:
| I'm not using and apple device, but I use them with wireguard
| on mobile. Works fine for me.
|
| I'm pretty sure the mobile WiFi handover is handled in your
| phone firmware and not by the VPN app, I would guess that's got
| to do with apple software but I could be wrong.
| DavideNL wrote:
| I also use WireGuard with ProtonVpn on iPhone, which works
| fine.
| IceWreck wrote:
| Hey, I know this is the original title but please rename it to be
| more descriptive. I saw the title , assumed the worst and then
| was reassured on reading the article.
| JoachimS wrote:
| what would be a better title?
| xvector wrote:
| "Mullvad VPN isn't going anywhere"
|
| "We will not sell MullvadVPN"
| mbesto wrote:
| "we are not interested in ever selling it."
|
| I know very little about Mullvad specifically, but my general
| presumption when an organization says this, it means the
| opposite.
|
| _Everyone_ has a price.
| daniel-cussen wrote:
| In economic theory, yes, everyone has a price.
| vibrio wrote:
| That price isn't always denominated in money. There are
| people that value altruism or other motivations.
| JoachimS wrote:
| That is why it isn't a scientific theory. It is an
| assumption.
| chmod775 wrote:
| > Everyone has a price.
|
| No. You really can't buy some people.
|
| Either because they already have more money than they know how
| to use, or because they have, you know, principles.
| shawnz wrote:
| Money can be used to better realize your principles. It's
| sort of like the trolley problem. What if you were being
| offered so much money that you felt you could achieve a
| greater net good with it than without?
| chmod775 wrote:
| > What if you were being offered so much money that you
| felt you could achieve a greater net good with it than
| without?
|
| "The ends don't justify the means" is also a principle. And
| it's a good one. 'Many a great evil has been done in the
| name of good' etc.
|
| If someone won't kill their grandma for one billion
| dollars, they probably won't do it for 10 billion either.
| mbesto wrote:
| I think you're arguing something entirely differently.
|
| > And it's a good one.
|
| You're acting as if myself or the parent comment think
| everyone in business is evil. AFAIK you have no intimate
| knowledge about the founders and their motivations or
| what they believe to be "good", seemingly that they have
| some benevolent worldy principled intentions. At no point
| am I arguing that people don't have principles, just that
| those principles may manifest themselves in different
| ways (as the parent pointed out, the owners might sell
| and start a non profit privacy based solution, just like,
| ya know, Brian Acton did)
| chmod775 wrote:
| I was responding to what I quoted in my initial comment.
| And I meant what I said, nothing more, nothing less.
|
| Please don't ascribe things to me that I did not say.
| Thanks a bunch.
|
| We're here to evaluate whether the statement " _Everyone_
| has a price. " (emphasis yours) is true or not and I have
| no interest in anything beyond that.
|
| After all that's the part of your post I quoted.
| simonebrunozzi wrote:
| You can negative-buy someone. Meaning: you can pay other
| "actors" to make their life so miserable that they will
| consider selling (or conceding whatever you would be asking
| of them).
|
| In that sense, everyone has a price. It just doesn't
| necessarily go directly in their pockets.
| chmod775 wrote:
| Even so I know for a fact this won't work on everyone.
| Whatever you may do to them or offer them.
|
| As long as there is people willing to literally die for a
| cause, this won't change.
| zxlk21e wrote:
| This doesn't seem like the best heuristic. Your automatic
| interpretation of "we are not interested in selling" is "we are
| interested in selling"?
| mbesto wrote:
| I'm being slightly facetious.
|
| I don't know why Mullvad issued a notice to talk about
| ownership, but I presume it was because they've gotten alot
| of M&A interest or it's a marketing move to garner trust from
| their client-base (i.e. others are getting distrust for
| selling).
|
| I know more examples of companies who publicly say they're
| not interested in selling that do than those that don't. In
| other words, why be public about it?[0] Clearly there is M&A
| interest for a company like this.
|
| Do you know any for-profit orgs that say publicly they aren't
| selling and actually don't? Most I know simply aren't public
| about it.
|
| [0] - Btw - one M&A trick to drive up a valuation is to say
| you're not for sale. So yes this heuristic is absolutely
| valid in that sense.
| brendoelfrendo wrote:
| Probably because ExpressVPN announced their sale to Make
| the other day. They took advantage of the situation to day
| "hi, you can trust us because we're more principled than
| that," to both their existing customers and ExpressVPN
| users who want to jump ship.
| ghoward wrote:
| Upvoted because you have good points, but I thought I'd
| address one thing.
|
| > I don't know why Mullvad issued a notice to talk about
| ownership
|
| The reason is probably because ExpressVPN was just bought
| by Kape. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28552731
| mbesto wrote:
| Got it. Makes sense.
|
| > Upvoted because you have good points
|
| I have a feeling people are downvoting me because they
| think people are bad/evil for wanting money. Weird.
| Krasnol wrote:
| I didn't up nor downvote you because even though I think
| it's sad, I still see the interesting part in your
| comment:
|
| You represent a branch of people this system grew which
| would rather make up some story than to believe that
| people actually won't sell something because it's
| important to them.
| mbesto wrote:
| That's fair. To expand further, businesses are run people
| who have families, ambitions, etc. Starting and running
| companies puts a lot of stress on those factors. When
| someone offers you life changing to sell, your ideals
| around "protecting the greater good of the people" can
| quickly dilute.
| Krasnol wrote:
| Can you imagine that this greed-talk looks alien to some
| people out there? Look, their numbers look quite good
| already. I'm sure you can have a decent life in Sweden
| with all that money. So why should they feel the urge to
| sell? Where do you see this invisible magic force which
| has to turn everybody into greedy zombies without
| principles?
|
| And yes, think about their families. My SO would throw me
| out if I's sell what I believe in and I'd deserve it.
| What an example to the kids would that make? I'd be
| despicable to them.
| ghoward wrote:
| > I have a feeling people are downvoting me because they
| think people are bad/evil for wanting money. Weird.
|
| Yeah, I agree it's weird.
|
| Personally, I'd love to have enough money to not have to
| work the rest of my life, or worry about anything.
| Nothing evil with that.
| NabiDev wrote:
| imo still better than any other providers. the only thing bugging
| me is they should accept payment in xmr(which is untraceable).
| there is an alternative (ivpn.net) which is a little more
| expensive and accept in xmr but i've never tested out.
| rgrmrts wrote:
| I've been a Mullvad user for a while now and it's a really great
| service. Good speeds, good apps for mobile and desktop, and the
| flexibility to use wireguard yourself if needed.
|
| I stopped using privateinternetaccess when their ownership stuff
| became really sketchy. I'd highly recommend Mullvad to anyone
| else looking for a good VPN provider.
|
| Side note, Mozilla VPN uses Mullvad's network under the hood.
| duxup wrote:
| >Mozilla VPN uses Mullvad's network
|
| Yeah I finally decided to leave PIA and at the time Mozilla
| started their offering. I figured I'd go through Mozilla to
| provide them some support while switching to a service I have
| some faith in.
| tyjen wrote:
| Exact situation for myself. I was a PIA customer until Kape
| Technologies acquired PIA, prompting me to switch to Mullvad.
| After reading the post's title, I recoiled a little and said,
| "Oh no, not again," but, thankfully I was surprised by the
| content of the statement. I'm happy to see Mullvad is not
| compromising the quality of their service for a payout and
| continuing to demonstrate their value system that lead me to
| become a loyal customer.
| mst wrote:
| I felt a bit like that about PIA but at this point I'm just
| glad they're not owned by Andrew Lee anymore.
| drcongo wrote:
| I switched to Mullvad recently after a comment on HN in this
| thread [0], very happy with the switch.
|
| [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28165130
| Ms-J wrote:
| In that thread I learned a lot about Mullvad, thanks. Saw a
| few comments that made me wonder though.
| nirvdrum wrote:
| I've recently switched from PIA to Mullvad for similar reasons.
| I do wish Mullvad had a plan with a larger device limit. With
| PIA, I could cover my household with a single plan. Mullvad's
| five device limit is insufficient. Maintaining multiple
| accounts is just tedious. Aside from that, I've been pretty
| happy with the switch.
| shapefrog wrote:
| I googled to see if they are one of the vpn's that avertise
| agressively, apparently if I am not using <insert vpn> I am
| going to have cybercriminals litterally reach from under my
| desk and inappropriately touch me.
|
| They seem to be one that doesnt have an affiliate programme, so
| they go to the top of my trust ranking.
| y4mi wrote:
| You can even pay for their service by mailing physical cash
| to their office!
|
| I've been on a subscription for ages now. Haven't really
| cared about that amount of anonymity so I'm just using a
| Paypal for payment though
| rchaud wrote:
| Protonmail/ProtonVPN allows cash payments by snail mail as
| well.
| [deleted]
| reaperducer wrote:
| _apparently if I am not using <insert vpn> I am going to have
| cybercriminals litterally reach from under my desk and
| inappropriately touch me._
|
| Reminds me of the old "ZOMG! Your computer is broadcasting an
| IP address!! Send us money to save your live!!11!eleventy!1"
| ads.
| hoppyhoppy2 wrote:
| They're also NYT Wirecutter's top pick, in large part because
| of their strong stance on privacy, publicly-available 3rd-
| party security audit and ability to pay anonymously.
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-vpn-service/
| basch wrote:
| and privacyguides.org (formerly privacytools.io)
| https://www.privacyguides.org/providers/vpn/
| y-c-o-m-b wrote:
| I also switched from privateinternetaccess to Mullvad (I think
| about 3 years ago?). I've had a few issues with Mullvad's speed
| in the past, but the last couple of years has been smooth
| service. My only complaint - and please note I havent check
| recently if this is still the case - is there's no discount for
| yearly subscriptions. I usually buy 12 months at a time and I
| wish they'd shave a few bucks off that, but honestly it's a
| very affordable service to begin with.
| nvarsj wrote:
| I really like Mullvad, but I personally found the speeds to be
| pretty poor. It's been a while since I used it, but I remember
| not even being able to hit 100mbps download at times. On the
| other hand, in my experience, competitors can max out a gigabit
| connection.
| Omniusaspirer wrote:
| Some Mullvad servers are oversaturated at times, but I've
| been easily maxing a gigabit connection on Dallas servers for
| 6 months now. You just need to specify a specific server when
| connecting. If it's slow, try the next- generally higher #'s
| are better.
| [deleted]
| walterbell wrote:
| Could you share some of those competitors? I've tried a few
| VPNs which have not been especially fast, e.g.
| https://ovpn.com. Would like to find one that supports IPsec,
| which is supported natively by several operating systems.
| TedDoesntTalk wrote:
| FoxyProxy supports IPSec and OpenVPN.
| nvarsj wrote:
| PIA (yeah, I know they are owned by a dodgy company now,
| and I sound like a shill by suggesting them) does really
| well. No problem maxing a gigabit connection, and their
| peering is even better than my ISP a lot of the time - I
| get lower latency when playing games on US servers when
| using their network. I reluctantly signed back up after
| having speed issues w/ Mullvad.
| photon-torpedo wrote:
| That's odd, I'm in London/UK and when I use Mullvad's London
| servers I can usually nearly max out a Gbit connection.
| nvarsj wrote:
| Interesting... maybe I should try again. I didn't have much
| luck on Virgin.
| rgrmrts wrote:
| What ISP do you use if you don't mind me asking? I'm on
| Verizon FIOS and I'm convinced they throttle certain traffic.
| I pay for 940mbps and generally get around 800 wired or 5-600
| on wireless, but have noticed my speeds (on VPN) drop to
| 2-300. I do this dance with them every couple of months, get
| on the phone with support and just keep saying "ok yup did
| that still not seeing the correct speeds" and after a while
| they'll sometimes say "let us try something on our end" after
| which speeds recover and stay good for a while til they start
| (allegedly) throttling again.
|
| EDIT: I've gotten around 90% of my non-VPN speed through
| Mullvad FWIW
| hikerclimber1 wrote:
| Everything is subjective. Especially laws. That's why people
| should revolt against their government.
| aleppe7766 wrote:
| A striking difference from the former intelligence official led
| competitor.
| legrande wrote:
| > Mullvad VPN is here to stay, and we are not interested in ever
| selling it
|
| Yeah we don't want another Kape Technologies acquisition[0]. Kape
| already own Cyberghost, PrivateInternetAccess and Zenmate. If
| they bought Mullvad, I would immediately stop using Mullvad since
| Kape is Israeli and could _possibly_ be tapped by Mossad (I keep
| an open mind about that however).
|
| [0] https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/kape-
| technol...
| Kiro wrote:
| I believe the whole reason for this post is because Kape just
| bought ExpressVPN.
| sneak wrote:
| You should assume your VPN provider is tapped regardless of who
| owns it or what jurisdiction it is in.
|
| The fiber runs right out of the building.
|
| You use a VPN to obscure your client IP from websites and app
| backends, not government mass surveillance.
| pgrote wrote:
| Kape also just bought Expressvpn.
|
| https://www.expressvpn.com/blog/expressvpn-joining-kape/
|
| It was a bummer to see the news.
| MentatOnMelange wrote:
| Wow, I had no idea. I was a longtime PIA user, guess its time
| to switch again. My only issue with Mullvad is netflix blocks
| them (potential irony there).
| yonig wrote:
| HBO as well
| RealStickman_ wrote:
| Some servers used to work for me last time I tried. (It has
| been a while though)
| aorth wrote:
| Ah wow, and ExpressVPN was also recently in the news because
| their CIO was one of three former U.S. intelligence
| operatives who "illegally helped the United Arab Emirates
| hack people".
|
| https://twitter.com/josephmenn/status/1437885720169836544
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _don 't want another Kape Technologies acquisition_
|
| Purely for schadenfreude, do we have any evidence the volume of
| leavers was meaningful?
| MentatOnMelange wrote:
| They began offering much more generous deals on PIA after the
| aquisition, so I'm guessing enough people left for it to
| affect their bottom line.
| crowbahr wrote:
| They definitely don't post about it.
|
| I closed my account with PIA right after the sellout was
| announced. I received several emails with form letters about
| Kape actually being really dedicated to privacy and you can
| totally trust them buying PIA. Made me think that they took a
| noticeable hit.
| deadalus wrote:
| Mullvad is located in Sweden(14 eyes, xkeyscore).
| samsari wrote:
| SAPO is not the Mossad
| sodality2 wrote:
| SAPO would comply with fourteen eyes directives, no? Is
| that not what 14 eyes membership implies?
| mike_d wrote:
| No, that isn't what membership implies. It is a
| cooperation and data sharing agreement, it doesn't unify
| countries intelligence agencies across borders.
|
| For example GE makes engines for Boeing airplanes. They
| may have a cooperative agreement and mutual non-
| disclosure agreements that allow engineers and designers
| to share engine attachment and airframe details freely,
| but that doesn't mean GE employees have access to
| information on the radio headsets.
| jeltz wrote:
| I do not think it is SAPO you need to worry about, it is
| FRA who does most spying.
| xvector wrote:
| I don't know why you'd give an Israeli tech firm the benefit of
| the doubt. The country's tech industry is literally
| surveillance. Kape is not just "possibly" a surveillance
| operation, it 100% _definitely_ is.
| endgame wrote:
| That title made me expect an "incredible journey" post. I'm very
| glad that it wasn't.
| kiryin wrote:
| Privateinternetaccess was the first VPN service I ever purchased,
| out of necessity when the internet piracy scene first began
| showing signs of the predatory mess it is today. They happened to
| sponsor/fund some things in my sphere of interest and were
| relatively reputable between my circle of acquaintances. But I am
| sure if you've been paying attention, you know how that ended.
|
| Since then I have been a customer of Mullvad's and honestly, no
| affiliation, they're on another level entirely. Being able to pay
| in cash and have an account with zero information attached to it
| brings a peace of mind, even though it's totally unnecessary, at
| least in my humble use case. Being able to use wireguard directly
| with no weird app in between fits my needs perfectly as well,
| goodbye borderline-unsupported custom OpenVPN configurations.
| This is how an online "service" business should be run imo. My
| only fear is that they'll meet the same end as PIA at some point,
| or get themselves into trouble with data-hungry law enforcement.
| peddling-brink wrote:
| I haven't been paying attention. How did that end?
|
| EDIT: Oh, Kape purchased them. I assume that's it.
| tpmx wrote:
| FYI: Since they're a Swedish AB/aktiebolag their financial
| numbers are publicly available:
|
| https://www.allabolag.se/5567839807/amagicom-ab
|
| Surprisingly humble numbers. 2020 revenue was ~$2M.
| Kiro wrote:
| According to their annual report (which you can download for
| free from hitta.se) they transferred Mullvad to the subsidiary
| Mullvad VPN AB in 2020, which had a revenue of $4M:
| https://www.allabolag.se/5592384001/mullvad-vpn-ab
| tpmx wrote:
| Good catch. 2021 revenue will probably be quite a bit more,
| then.
| scns wrote:
| Well, i'd assume that only a smaller part of the computer using
| part of humanity knows what a VPN is. Since they are offering a
| service out of ideolical reasons, with competitors that
| advertise agressively, a low revenue/profit is totally fine
| with me. Enough to keep the lights on and build reserves.
| Citizens of rich countries can be contended with what they
| have, which is a lot if you look at the other 90% of humanity.
| Even if, you are "poor" by your counties standard can still
| feel rich, content and happy.
| masterof0 wrote:
| I love mullvad too. I don't use it for two reasons: 1- I can't
| watch Netflix when I'm connected. 2- Does not work reliably in
| China. Express VPN does work for me, although it is probably not
| very secure. If they fix those issues, I will switch without a
| doubt.
| Scarbutt wrote:
| _We keep no activity logs. Your IP address is replaced by one of
| ours, ensuring that your device 's activity and location are not
| linked to you._
|
| Where have we seen this before... ;)
|
| Surely if requested by their government they will keep logs for
| any specific customer, just like it happen with protonmail.
| RealStickman_ wrote:
| VPNs, at least in Switzerland, are regulated differently and
| aren't forced to give up their customers.
| JoachimS wrote:
| Mullvad is from Sweden. Not only spelled differently but has
| different laws and legal system too.
| Nextgrid wrote:
| I don't get the business model of a VPN. You're willingly
| becoming a magnet for scum, crime, piracy and malware, with
| maybe 1% of legitimate users.
|
| Surely the support costs of dealing with all the constant abuse
| reports would outweigh the fee they are charging, not to
| mention the costs of running the infrastructure (if they're
| used for piracy they'd need quite a bit of bandwidth)?
|
| Even if you are legally in the clear, it doesn't strike me as a
| business someone wants to get involved in unless there are
| alternative objectives they don't disclose.
| oefrha wrote:
| > Surely the support costs of dealing with all the constant
| abuse reports would outweigh the fee they are charging
|
| Employing /dev/null to handle abuse reports is usually pretty
| cheap.
| ziddoap wrote:
| >with maybe 1% of legitimate users
|
| I'm interested to know where you sourced that number? There
| are plenty of legitimate use cases for a VPN.
|
| While I agree there is definitely users with subpar
| intentions, I highly doubt 99% of people subscribing to a VPN
| are doing it because they are 'scum'.
| danachow wrote:
| I mean his comment is _the_ illustrative argument for why
| VPNs exist. Basically in a world where a Westerner (a
| historically relatively more liberal bunch) categorizes 99%
| of everything they don't agree with as scum, copyright
| infringement, or worse - that's all the motivation you need
| for safe, reliable communication infrastructure.
| tmp538394722 wrote:
| Is piracy not a legitimate usage?
| Nextgrid wrote:
| Piracy is something that some powerful entities would
| prefer you didn't do. Some people may consider it
| legitimate, some don't, but from a business point of view
| the problem is that you still have some big guys with big
| budgets against you.
| Arainach wrote:
| No, it's not. You have no inherent right to others' work.
| You can pay the owners' requested price or you can go
| without. Piracy is neither legally nor morally defensible.
| kroltan wrote:
| Piracy does not even inherently inhibit the _creators_
| from getting their monetary compensation.
|
| Nowadays, I pirate games I paid for, so I don't have to
| run invasive and performance-degrading DRM software that
| makes assumptions about current computers that might not
| hold in the future.
|
| It's about convenience and archival, and the creator's
| compensation.
|
| Philosophically, it's also about protesting about the
| nature of private property and how in many cases
| nowadays, a "purchase" is in fact more akin to a _lease_.
| jdreaver wrote:
| > nor morally defensible.
|
| I don't think this is accurate. There are plenty of
| legitimate critiques against intellectual property, for
| example: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/intellectual-
| property/#Ge...
| hyperman1 wrote:
| In my country, we pay a tax on all storage media which
| goes to content creators. We get to copy any content we
| legally own at the time of copying, even if borrowed from
| a friend or library.
|
| So yes, I have an inherent legal and moral right to
| others' work as I pay for it.
| mercora wrote:
| its like that in germany. well not really but it was
| supposed to be like this but later on it got illegal to
| circumvent digital protection regardless how trivial it
| was. the fees are still in place though...
| probably_wrong wrote:
| You can definitely make a moral argument in favor of
| piracy as a form of civil disobedience. Aaron Schwartz
| [1] and the book Free Culture[2] are the two bigger
| examples that come to mind.
|
| [1] https://cccc.ncte.org/cccc/committees/ip/ipreports/sw
| artzcas...
|
| [2] https://lessig.org/product/free-culture/
| Arainach wrote:
| Lessig's point isn't what you're making it out to be.
| Lessening the length of copyright isn't endorsement of
| wholesale piracy.
|
| Artists need food, shelter, and comfort just like
| everyone else. Those things cost money. Even an artist
| who feels a need to create needs enough funding to
| survive and get materials. Great works of art require
| funding. This is particularly true for things like movies
| and video games - you can have some smaller indie passion
| projects, but the kind of funding for AAA games or
| blockbuster movies doesn't just appear out of thin air -
| it requires a return on investment. If piracy was
| widespread and universally acceptable, this content would
| not exist.
|
| Again, AAA games aren't a couple of passionate friends.
| George on the engine team doesn't want to spend 2 days
| hunting down an obscure collision detection bug if
| they're not getting paid.
| monocularvision wrote:
| Civil disobedience means accepting the consequences of
| your actions to affect public perception and motivate
| change. Using a VPN is the opposite of that.
| jpetrucc wrote:
| I love Mullvad, I've been a happy user of theirs for many years!
| _joel wrote:
| I've been using Mullvad with Wireguard for some time now, it's
| been pretty rock solid apart from occasions where one host will
| get saturated but a quick switch to another in the region and
| it's never been a big issue (you get that will all providers I
| suppose).
| risho wrote:
| mullvad has a long history of proving itself as being a good
| faith actor in the space. it's also first to step into new
| technology and infrastructure because they are truly interested
| and ideologically invested in what they are doing.
|
| they don't use accounts or collect email addresses.
|
| they accept cash in the mail
|
| no matter what you think about crypto they were probably one of
| if not the first companies in the world to start accepting
| bitcoin in 2010 and have always self hosted their infrastructure,
| not offloading it to bitpay or whatever other company that just
| funnels right into chain analysis companies. back then bitcoin
| was on the super fringe and the only people interested and
| involved in it where people that were ideologically aligned with
| it's vision.
|
| They started funding wireguard before it was cool and before
| anyone else gave a shit about wireguard.
|
| They are the backbone for mozilla's vpn.
|
| You can never REALLY be sure, but from what I can tell mullvad is
| the most honest and sincere vpn company in the space and I
| wouldn't even consider going anywhere else.
| slg wrote:
| >no matter what you think about crypto they were probably one
| of if not the first companies in the world to start accepting
| bitcoin in 2010
|
| I remember spending north of 25 bitcoins on a month of Mullvad
| back in those days. I don't remember the exact price, but I do
| remember mining a single 50 bitcoin block was not enough to
| purchase 2 months. That is at least $1.2m a month for VPN
| service if we use today's prices. If they actually held on to
| any of the bitcoin from those days, I am guessing the company
| and the owners have no real financial motivation to sell.
| Fnoord wrote:
| > [...] I am guessing the company and the owners have no real
| financial motivation to sell.
|
| This makes no sense. We don't know what the future of
| Bitcoin's market cap is going to do. That's why it is
| speculation.
|
| Personally, I don't see the point of holding any
| cryptocurrency I own.
| PretzelPirate wrote:
| I believe the person you responded to was saying "...and
| owners have no real financial motivation to sell [their
| company]" and wasn't making a prediction on the future
| price of Bitcoin.
| Fnoord wrote:
| Thanks for the clarification! Makes sense now.
| char8 wrote:
| For once it's the auti-bitcoiners with the relentless
| knee-jerking. Nervous much.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| Why would you "[...]" the first part of the sentence that
| explains exactly why it could have made sense?
| Fnoord wrote:
| Not really. Say I buy Bitcoins in 2012 and sell them in
| 2014. I paid the very market value in 2012, and received
| the very market value in 2014. All this 'regret' with
| 'hindsight 20/20' fails to take into account that one
| cannot know how the market value is going to be in 1
| month, 1 year, or any time table. That is why its
| speculation.
| godelski wrote:
| The above comment doesn't really come down to speculation
| though. It really just depends how much of that BTC they
| turned into cash to buy infrastructure or pay people.
| Considering that it is logistically easier to do this
| with just money rather than exchanging, then it isn't
| unlikely that they maintained a fair amount of that BTC,
| and thus the "they probably have a bunch of money"
| conclusion.
|
| I'm not sure why FOMO has to do with any of this. Your
| logic also just doesn't make sense when talking about any
| investment. If the market value goes up and you continue
| to hold then you can sell it for more than you bought it
| for. No one is talking about regret here except you. All
| investing is speculative. That's the nature of investing.
| Y_Y wrote:
| All investing involves some speculation, that's true. But
| gold and t-bills and startup equity and shitcoins all
| involve very different kinds of speculation.
| Forbo wrote:
| Would we be having the same conversation if they had
| stock in GAFAM instead of Bitcoin?
| Y_Y wrote:
| Maybe if it was the early days of Microsoft. Even then
| there was a lot more data available about investing in
| businesses, even revolutionary computer ones. Nobody had
| knew for sure what was going to happen with Bitcoin, and
| the plausible outcomes varied hugely.
| godelski wrote:
| Yeah but if someone was buying a service from you in MSFT
| and you didn't need to cash it all out to pay expenses
| and salaries, would you? Or would you keep some of the
| stock saying "ehhh fuck it. Let's see what happens?"
|
| Also, considering that early day cryptocurrency
| enthusiasts were also bullish on the technology that
| adjusts the chance that they'd keep some. I'm not sure
| why this is such a debate. The original comment just said
| "hey, they might have kept some of that crypto that
| people would pay them in. If they did, then they probably
| don't have to worry themselves with money." That's a
| speculative comment but also has a decent likelihood of
| being true.
| Fnoord wrote:
| > The above comment doesn't really come down to
| speculation though. It really just depends how much of
| that BTC they turned into cash to buy infrastructure or
| pay people. Considering that it is logistically easier to
| do this with just money rather than exchanging, then it
| isn't unlikely that they maintained a fair amount of that
| BTC, and thus the "they probably have a bunch of money"
| conclusion.
|
| Yes, I misunderstood the point.
|
| The US government gets rid of Bitcoins ASAP, and I know
| of businesses who accept Bitcoin and who also sell it
| ASAP.
| slg wrote:
| You are overthinking my comment. All I was saying is that
| this company and the people leading it have been involved
| with bitcoin since the price was measured in cents. It goes
| back so far that it predates the bitcoin payment processors
| that would handle transactions and pay you out in your
| currency of choice. Odds are they have had some stake in
| bitcoin. They therefore have likely made money as the value
| of that bitcoin has increased.
|
| And for the record I generally don't have a positive
| opinion of cryptocurrencies and am specifically down on
| bitcoin. I am not projecting what the market cap will be in
| the future. I am simply commenting on its history.
| Y_Y wrote:
| This line of reasoning is disappointingly unpopular. I
| think it fits a weird pattern of selection effects, where
| people get rich from very risky ventures (often retconned
| to have been savvy, precient business decisions) and it's
| implied that what they did was a good idea. Naturally
| there's no visibility for other crazy ventures that go
| nowhere, and it's much less fun to look at people who lost
| big by getting in on the top floor, chasing the success of
| people who were pretty smart, but _very_ lucky.
|
| Ultimately your expected marginal value for speculative
| investments where you don't have significant expertise or
| scale or regulatory capture or magical powers has to be
| negative.
| majormajor wrote:
| Speculative investments like that are somewhat like the
| lottery, though you'd hope people would be a bit more
| informed to improve their odds compared to the lottery.
| In which case, your EV may still be negative overall, but
| if the potential effect size of "winning" is magnitudes
| larger than your downside risk, it still might make sense
| if you want a chance to entirely change your
| circumstances, vs just slowly amass savings over time.
| rootsudo wrote:
| ouch, and geez, and ouch.
|
| Same boat with hosting services. 100% relatable.
| IgorPartola wrote:
| I remember spending $20 on a plain medium cheese pizza in
| 2010. If only I instead bought BTC with that $20 and held it
| until today.
|
| What exactly is the difference between our scenarios?
| haliskerbas wrote:
| "It is better to have loved and lost than to have never
| loved at all."
|
| The commenter you are replying to, had and sold, but you
| never had at all.
| IgorPartola wrote:
| I had and sold at $1k/BTC. Thought I made out like a
| bandit considering what I paid for BTC/had mined it using
| free resources.
|
| But my point stands: the idea that just because you had
| BTC at some point doesn't really negate the fact that you
| had no prior knowledge. If you did, I bet you would have
| spent all your money and took out huge loans to buy more
| BTC at $2 or even $0.20. It's a fallacy to think that
| just because you actually converted $ to BTC that somehow
| makes your lost opportunity cost more special than if you
| just held/spent $.
| ipaddr wrote:
| Can you expand on:
|
| "bitpay or whatever other company that just funnels right into
| chain analysis companies"
|
| Is that risk with bitpay? Curious to learn more about chain
| analysis I thought they would analysis all transaction..
| Mengkudulangsat wrote:
| Service providers and exchanges are required to abide by the
| new travel rule imposed by the FATF. They simply can't
| facilitate any transactions that's on a no-name basis.
| photochemsyn wrote:
| #3 "We do use a third party to operate our email service, so we
| remind you to carefully read #1 again."
|
| #1 "If privacy is of utmost concern, we recommend that you
| refrain from communicating any personal data to us since plain-
| text email is not a safe media for communication. If necessary,
| use PGP-encrypted email."
|
| So, it sounds like emails are stored on a third-party server,
| encrypted or not? This is sort of unavoidable for email as I
| understand it.
| [deleted]
| ajklsdhfniuwehf wrote:
| most email protocol depends on plain text changing hands
| along the way.
|
| if you care about privacy and even considers plain text
| email... i don't even know what to suggest you.
| risho wrote:
| sorry when i say they dont collect emails, i mean they don't
| collect your email address. they don't know your email when
| you use their service. your "username" is just a random
| string of numbers. there is no email. there is no password. i
| dont know anything about how they store their personal email
| stuff. since they don't have my email address and i've never
| needed to send them an email, i'm not particularly worried
| about it.
|
| i should have been more clear though (and i updated my
| original comment to reflect this)
| flotzam wrote:
| They have the most anonymity-friendly signup flow I've ever
| seen:
|
| 1. Literally click a button on the homepage
|
| 2. Here are the automatically generated credentials for your
| new account, which you can load up by sending _any_ amount of
| cryptocurrency (perfect for emptying out an old wallet)
|
| I don't even bother renewing, that's how easy it is to make a
| fresh throwaway. Which they encourage!
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| Excuse the ignorance, but what do they do when LEO knocks and
| asks "At 2:34am CST, we saw IP address <x.y.z.w> downloaded
| child porn. Who was it?"
|
| They just say "We don't know"? Aren't there consequences for
| letting people download illegal content via your servers?
|
| It seems likely that they would say "At 2:43am CST, the IP
| address proxying <x.y.z.w> was <your actual IP>," at which
| point LEO would knock on your ISP's door. Right?
|
| I think it's totally crazy (as in actually-insane) to trust
| your life to these services. You're right, you can't really be
| sure. And if you're in a situation where you need to protect
| your identity, you're already caught.
| hammock wrote:
| Mullvad is THE ONLY mainstream VPN that doesn't have seriously
| questionable credibility.
|
| Not even Proton VPN is OK - sleuths have figured out that it's
| just a white-labeled version of NordVPN.
|
| I am thankful that Mullvad is doubling down on their commitment
| to integrity, because there isn't an alternative.
| intsunny wrote:
| > Not even Proton VPN is OK - sleuths have figured out that
| it's just a white-labeled version of NordVPN.
|
| Do you have links to this evidence/proof?
| EthOptimist wrote:
| So the main thing risk would be if they are consistently
| logging things such as client IP, user agent etc.
| ziddoap wrote:
| I've been a long-time user of Mullvad, and can only say good
| things.
|
| No usernames, cash payments, published audits by reputable
| companies, handy FAQ/guide section, sleek application, split-
| tunelling, etc.
|
| In the mess that is VPN products, it's refreshing to see Mullvad
| stick to its original goals.
| sva_ wrote:
| I'm really glad that Mullvad is taking this stance after the
| recent sale of ExpressVPN.
|
| I wonder (hope for them) that they kept the bitcoin they've been
| getting by some people, including me, when bitcoin was around 1-2
| euro each. If so, they must have 'fuck you money' now anyways.
| the_duke wrote:
| I haven't seen anyone question why they would write such a blog
| post in the first place.
|
| This might suggest that they have a potential buyer who is
| aggressively trying to convince them to sell.
|
| This could be Mozilla, considering their recent partnership. But
| more likely either a competitor that doesn't want to see them
| grow too much, or someone who really wants to get their hands on
| the data. Like a three letter agency shell company or hacker
| group.
| jzymbaluk wrote:
| This was my question: why write this in the first place, since
| this is basically an announcement of no change. Makes sense
| that someone is trying to acquire them, especially given how
| crazy the VPN space has gotten and considering the mozilla deal
| random_78979 wrote:
| To me it seems to be an answer to
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28552731
|
| https://alternativeto.net/news/2021/9/kape-technologies-buys...
| the_duke wrote:
| An attempt to capture customers leaving ExpressVPN makes
| sense.
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| Since it comes up often on here, these are the reasons why I use
| a VPN provider:
|
| 1. my threat model is not my government. It seems that the TLAs
| have thoroughly pwned our privacy for a long time now. (please
| note that I am in no way advocating for this mass surveillance,
| but I don't see that I have much choice in the matter)
|
| 2. My threat model includes my ISP. I am forced to use a scummy
| ISP who would openly steal my data if I let them. Same with my
| mobile provider.
|
| 3. My threat model includes the data thieves who have obvious
| business models built around selling my stolen data to the
| highest bidder.
|
| 4. My threat model includes black hats and script kiddies.
|
| 5. Do I trust my VPN provider? Eh. A little. For now. The thing
| is, I trust them more than #s 2,3,4 above. What other choice do I
| have?
| EveYoung wrote:
| How does a VPN help with #3 and #4? Once your data is with a
| service provider, it doesn't really matter how it got there.
| SmellTheGlove wrote:
| 2. is mine, and I really should get a VPN. I'm not interesting
| in the least, but I have no doubt xfinity is profiling user
| data and selling to advertisers.
| OJFord wrote:
| Oof, that's a scary way to title such a harmless/reassuring
| article!
| dylan604 wrote:
| Clickbait works both ways.
| kzrdude wrote:
| What's scary about it? It's quite mundane/matter of fact
| xvector wrote:
| Usually such titles are used when the company has been sold
| OJFord wrote:
| That's objectively true, but it's the sort of style we so
| often see for 'we have sold the company to blah' or 'we are
| ceasing operations' etc. posts; so it's, to me anyway,
| 'scary' by association.
| fnord77 wrote:
| is there any advantage to using the mozilla vpn layer or just
| using mullvad directly?
| NabiDev wrote:
| technically the same but for anonymity, u should buy directly.
| aborsy wrote:
| The problem is, there is no way to verify such statements.
| JoachimS wrote:
| All of the statements or specific ones? That the owners are the
| one stated can be verified. The business register (a Swedish
| agency) is here: https://bolagsverket.se/
|
| The registration, books etc for limited companies (aktiebolag
| AB) are public information. As someone else pointed out, there
| are also third party information sources like allabolag:
|
| https://www.allabolag.se/5592384001/mullvad-vpn-ab
| luke2m wrote:
| Down?
| SkyMarshal wrote:
| I assume this is a response to Kape Technologies buying
| ExpressVPN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28552731
| maeln wrote:
| While I applaud Mullvad intention and business model, I wonder
| how long they will be able to operate this way.
|
| Their company is Swedish and therefore must respect Swedish _and_
| EU laws. It would be very easy to end up in a ProtonMail /VPN
| situation. I don't know if Sweden has laws that allow
| police/judge to order to log one's customer data, but I would be
| surprised if they don't or at least will have in the future, by
| their own legislation or EU's.
| photochemsyn wrote:
| "Mullvad's vision is to make censorship and mass surveillance
| impractical."
|
| I'm pretty convinced that the only way to do this is through
| enforceable legal restrictions, not through technology. This is
| because those with deep pockets (nation-states and multinational
| corporations) will always have the technological edge over any
| average user.
|
| In addition, any operating business has to operate under the laws
| of the host country, see what happened with Lavabits and its
| refusal to hand over email encryption keys in 2013:
|
| "The court ordered Levison to be fined $5,000 a day beginning 6
| August until he handed over electronic copies of the keys. Two
| days later Levison handed over the keys hours after he shuttered
| Lavabit."
|
| The only way to stop nation-states and multinationals from spying
| on everyone and everything is to make it illegal for them to do
| so, and to enforce those laws with meaningful punishments.
| andrey_utkin wrote:
| This sounds naive.
|
| Part of a problem is that people with legislation-changing
| privileges are on the other side of the conflict.
|
| If privacy-seeking people don't have a practical leverage for a
| negotiation, they can't sustain the legislation and enforcement
| tilted in their favour.
|
| For example, the USSR was meant to be a very liberal and
| democratic state. At the very beginning, soldiers elected their
| officers! How long ago have you voted for your favorite manager
| to manage you at work? But given the "network effects" of the
| armed and aggressive party organization, the power was quickly
| centralized and pretty soon lowly individuals' needs and lives
| were worth nothing.
| photochemsyn wrote:
| Well, there was no Bill of Rights in the Soviet Union... or
| China... or Saudi Arabia. And that Bill of Rights provides a
| legal basis for opposition to an American government that
| clearly envies Chinese and Saudi state control systems.
|
| Now my point is simply that technology has not allowed
| repressed people in Saudi Arabia or China to defeat or evade
| state surveillance technology, has it? Now, I have no doubt
| the US government would love to have that kind of power - and
| the only thing stopping it from reaching out and taking that
| power is the legal system.
|
| Of course, blatant violation of the legal system by the state
| is possible. So is violent armed resistance and civil war.
| But, I think a government that tried to toss the Bill of
| Rights would be a government with no legitimacy. See
| Declaration of Independence.
| kiryin wrote:
| The way to stop nation-state-level spying is, if I understand
| correctly, to make it illegal? I'm not sure I follow.
| photochemsyn wrote:
| Well, prior to the legal system, the only way to resolve
| conflicts between humans was, well, violence. So, if the
| legal system loses legitimacy, we are back to violence as a
| dispute resolution system. Probably not a good idea, unless
| there's an authoritarian imperial Nazi setup that need to be
| sent down to Hell.
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