Comment by DonGateley | Hacker News Reader

Comment by DonGateley | Hacker News Reader

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"Your VPN provider's IP address is public information. A quick subpoena is all it would take to reveal your identity. Seems like a risky way to watch Game of Thrones. At least on Usenet a download is just a download."

A subpoena can only work if the VPN services keeps logs of its user's transactions. Some do and some don't. Without logs there is nothing to subpoena. When evaluating a VPN it is very important to find out whether or not they do. As of now U.S. VPN's cannot be forced to keep logs.

A well regarded resource for such evaluation is:

  https://torrentfreak.com/anonymous-vpn-service-provider-review-2015-150228/

A non-logging VPN with end to end encryption is absolutely required for safety using anything that transfers copyrighted material without permission. That includes both versions of Popcorn Time. Not taking this precaution is very, very expensive.

A bit more caution: if using a VPN's client application it is very important to ensure that they have a kill switch option which shuts down all internet traffic should the VPN connection drop. Many don't. Without that, your machine will continue to babble the copyrighted material in the unencrypted clear after a drop. Unless you are attending the transfer you may never know that is happening.

Alternatively, most all VPN services in addition to offering their own client app also provide URL's that you can plug into standard Windows VPN connections. Then you can use the VPNCheck application which provides a global kill switch that will stop all traffic if any Windows VPN disconnects. That's the route I choose.

So how do you ensure that they don't keep logs?

There really is no way to ensure that unfortunately. You can only go by reputation and their own statements in that regard. The resource I linked is a good place to start an investigation. At least it weeds out those that don't even make the claim and there are many of those.

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