Every time the VPN service industry is discussed on HN there is a barrage of comments that use keywords like “honeypot”, “snake oil”, and “shady”. I’m not denying that the industry has problems, but in this thread I’d like to focus on how we can improve it.

Please tell me - What makes a VPN provider trustworthy, and how do you _know_?

Personally I believe a trustworthy provider is _characterized_ by consistent actions that show transparency, honesty, and conscientiousness. Nevertheless, such consistent action doesn’t actually prove trustworthiness.

A good VPN honeypot, or reseller of your network traffic, is publicly indistinguishable from a trustworthy one. So what can the users do? What tools, technology, process, or ecosystem do they need to tell honest and dishonest apart? What do we need to build?

We all recognize that VPN providers are in a great position of power over their users. How do we tilt the scales in the users’ favor? What are _strong_ signals of trustworthiness?

Disclosure: I co-founded Mullvad.