Does anybody know is Hoxx VPN safe to use?
Does it install unwanted content to your computer or give your browsing information to some 3rd party?
Does it leak your IP if somebody ask it from them?
Or does it something else that you would probably not want to happen?
EDIT: Does it give my own bandwidth to somebody else while I use it?
Wrong sub, buddy; however, in the interest of your privacy: it’s a free VPN, and for VPNs when you don’t pay for a product YOU are the product. Don’t trust it one bit.
No VPN is “safe”. No free VPN is trustworthy.
Running a VPN costs money. If you’re not paying for it, someone else is, in exchange for something of yours.
No.
Best case: It injects ads and monitors your internet connection.
Worst case: It operates like Hola VPN and sells your real internet connection to shady individuals.
They have a pretty horrible privacy statement.
If you want free VPN, try the Opera browser, they included their own VPN, you can enable in the Setting. I didn’t research about their privacy policy but I think Opera is still a well know brand.
My main browser is still Firefox, I use Opera sometimes if the site doesn’t work well on Firefox or to test stuff.
The only exception that I know of is ProtonVPN, they have a free option with very limited servers (even though unlimited bandwidth!). The free servers are obviously very crowded.
(ProtonVPN is from the same guys as ProtonMail so they likely won’t pull any shady stuff)
Disclaimer: I personally use paid ProtonVPN, however I am not in any way sponsored by them to write this comment.
That being said, I agree that pretty much all free VPNs are bullshit and especially browser extensions often do stuff like Hola VPN and sell your real internet connection to cybercriminals.
GaianNeuron , can you be more precise: what of mine are they using? my PC information, my email information, my browser history, my bandwidth, something else what?
MartinsRedditAccount , how they can sell my Internet connection without my permission??
Isn’t that illegal?
CGA1 , can you be little more precise.
What can they do if you use their free VPN?
paid ProtonVPN
How does paid ProtonVPN work out for you?
I wonder if that’s the reason HoxVPN has gone down (well on my browser), I was on a paid subscription so presumed was relatively safe - but thanks for the update. Although I can’t find ProtonVPN on the google chrome store, is it only for Firefox?
Every piece of information available to them. They’re not going to route traffic over your connection (it’s not Tor), but whatever would otherwise be visible to someone snooping on the far end of your Internet connection will be visible to them – and identifiable as coming from you, specifically.
Remember that when you use a VPN service, you are not removing trust, simply moving it from some other party (typically, your ISP) to the VPN provider.
Think of it this way: if I wanted to profiteer from the VPN craze by offering a no-cost service, how could I make the most money?
Idk, not sure how Hola did it but I don’t think they ever got in trouble. I think they most likely legitimize it through some unspecific words in the TOS.
Taken directly from their privacy policy
By using the Services, users consent to the collection and use of their Personal Information by us. You also represent to us that you have any and all authorizations necessary to use these Services including using them to process Personal Information. We collect and use the information you provide to us, including information obtained from your use of the Services.
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- INFORMATION WE COLLECT AUTOMATICALLY WHEN YOU USE OUR ADDON:
2.1 When you access or use our Services, we automatically collect information about you, including:
a) Log Information: We log information about your use of our addon, including your browser type and language, access times, pages viewed, your IP address and the addon you visited before navigating to our addon.
b) Device Information: We may collect information about the device you use to access our Services, including the hardware model, operating system and version, unique device identifier, phone number, International Mobile Equipment Identity (“IMEI”) and mobile network information.
c) Location Information: With your consent, we may collect information about the location of your device to facilitate your use of certain features of our Services, determine the speed at which your device is traveling, add location-based filters (such as local weather), and for any other purposes.
d) We also may make use of third party tracking pixels used by advertising or analytical partners. Some such partners include, but are not limited to:
(i) Google Analytics: Used to track statistical information such as page visits and traffic source information allowing us to improve the performance and quality of the Site. For more information please visit: Google Marketing Platform - Unified Advertising and Analytics.
(ii) Google Advertising: Used to track conversions from advertisements on the Google Search and Google Display network. For more information please visit: http://www.google.com/policies/technologies/ads/. Third party pixels and content may make use of cookies. We do not have access or control over these third party cookies and this Policy does not cover the use of third party cookies.
e) We may collection information about quality of our service such as how fast a connection was established, how fast our servers are, whether you could connect to a certain server or not. Also details about actions made inside addon could be recorded for user experience improvement reasons.
f) We may delegate some functionality such as support to our websites outside of the addon, during this we may send information about your account such as email, userid, baseserver, clientversion, browser to these sites. These sites are part of our infrastructure and are made to offer better user-experience to our users. These websites are same as at ‘BYPASSING POLICY’ mentioned Baseservers.
Short answer: don’t use.
Pretty good! I previously used PIA and Tunnelbear and ProtonVPN is the best IMO.
Generally the speed was the same for all of them* , the reason I prefer Proton is that it’s based in Switzerland (Privacy + Consumer Rights) and doesn’t restrict anything on paid servers. ProtonVPN has a client (uses OpenVPN), OpenVPN and IKEv2. I personally use IKEv2 because for some reason OpenVPN causes issues for me sometimes (connection randomly cuts out for a few seconds).
Their ethics policy is pretty awesome too, for example they don’t have affiliate links.
As always though: do your own research before subscribing to a VPN service, many VPN providers are known for secretly advertising on Reddit.
*I have a 100/40mbit connection and get pretty much “bare-metal” speeds to German servers (where I live) and 50%+ to US.
Isn’t that by default only on the local network?
Pretty good! I previously used PIA and Tunnelbear and ProtonVPN is the best IMO.
Do they have US based servers as well with the paid version?
Yes, they have a bunch spread out over the US. You can see their server list here: VPN server list: Secure Proton VPN servers in 110+ countries | Proton VPN
I have the Plus plan but I often use Basic servers as well which both have good speeds.
How long have you been using it now?
Sorry for all the questions but I’ve been looking to make a change, myself.