“Aura does not record your VPN browsing activities in any way that can be associated back to you.
Logging PolicyĪura provides a single privacy policy for all its VPN products, which means it puts free products in the same category as premium products. This puts Hotspot Shield under the same umbrella as UltraVPN, Aura VPN, Betternet, Hexatech, VPN360, TouchVPN, and VPN in Touch. has become Pango, and Pango has been acquired by Aura. These are shady practices that have raised concern about whether the VPN can be trusted. The following year, a privacy advocacy group filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission that the VPN was intercepting user traffic to redirect it to partner websites. In 2016, a report revealed that the VPN was injecting JavaScript codes for advertising and tracking. This is especially due to its free VPN, which makes money through advertising. A VPN like NordVPN operates from the US but is registered in Panama, making it out of reach for the US government.Īpart from Jurisdiction, Hotspot Shield has a murky past in terms of privacy.
This is not a good choice of jurisdiction for a VPN as US service providers are often subject to subpoenas from the NSA. First, the VPN is based in the US, which puts it under the 5/9/14 eyes alliance. Privacy has been a controversial topic for several years when talking about Hotspot Shield VPN. Hotspot Shield is a secure VPN, although the service provider has come under fire numerous times. Hotspot Shield also provides a kill switch, IP leak protection, and an inbuilt DNS encryption mechanism to enhance privacy when torrenting. It does not limit torrenting speeds, and it actually encourages that you use the service when torrenting.
The VPN is one of the best torrenting options as it allows P2P/ torrent traffic on all its servers. This is because other VPNs such as Surfshark VPN provide more Netflix catalogs and offer a SmartDNS service. However, it does not make it to our list of the best VPNs for streaming. Overall, Hotspot Shield is great for streaming.