How have other major VPNs (e.g., ExpressVPN, IPVanish) handled historical law enforcement requests and transparency reporting?
Executive summary
ExpressVPN and several leading VPNs have responded to law‑enforcement pressure by publishing regular transparency reports that enumerate requests and outcomes — ExpressVPN reported 194 government or police requests in July–December 2023, for example [1] — while other providers have mixed histories: IPVanish once provided logs to U.S. authorities under prior ownership in 2016 but has since undergone audits asserting a no‑logs posture [2]. Industry practice has shifted away from secretive warrant canaries toward more detailed, periodic transparency reporting and third‑party audits, though jurisdiction and past incidents still complicate trust [1] [3] [2].
1. ExpressVPN: public counts, technical opacity, and the transparency-report pivot
ExpressVPN has embraced regular transparency reporting as a primary public defense against claims it secretly hands over user data, publishing counts such as the 194 government/police requests and large numbers of DMCA notices for a recent half‑year window [1]; at the same time the company continues to keep key client‑side implementations proprietary, which leaves engineers and privacy advocates calling for more open verification even as the firm discloses request volumes [1] [3].
2. IPVanish: a documented reversal and the audit playbook
IPVanish’s history is the cautionary tale often cited in coverage: under previous ownership it supplied user logs to the Department of Homeland Security in 2016, contradicting its then no‑logs claims, and that episode remains part of the public record used to question industry promises [2]. In response, IPVanish has pursued independent audits — notably a 2022 Leviathan Security Group review that the company says confirmed its no‑logs practices — a move designed to repair credibility, though critics note that audits and jurisdiction (IPVanish is U.S.‑based) cannot retroactively erase past cooperation [2] [4].
3. ProtonVPN, NordVPN and others: granular reporting and proactive disclosure
Some providers have gone beyond headline counts to publish context on legal basis and outcomes; ProtonVPN is singled out for transparency reports that list each legal request, its legal basis and how it was resolved, framing that level of detail as a model for accountability [3]. NordVPN and other large providers have also shifted from warrant canaries to regular transparency reports, arguing that frequent, explicit reporting offers clearer evidence of how requests are handled [5] [6].
4. CyberGhost and Private Internet Access: frequency, audits, and network design claims
CyberGhost publishes legal‑requests pages and promotes architectural features such as RAM‑only servers and independent verification to limit what can be produced to authorities, and it posts transparency material though frequency and depth vary by vendor [7] [3]. Private Internet Access reported hundreds of government demands in early 2024, underscoring that even providers with strong privacy branding can receive substantial numbers of legal requests and that reporting cadence matters to users evaluating risk [1].
5. Industry trends: from warrant canaries to detailed reports, plus the jurisdictional elephant
Across reporting, a clear industry trend appears: many VPNs have moved from warrant canaries — which attempt to silently flag government gagging — toward explicit, periodic transparency reports and third‑party audits as the principal accountability mechanism [1] [5]. Yet analysts and civil‑liberties groups caution that a company’s legal jurisdiction (Five/Eyes membership, national data laws) and past conduct shape how meaningful a report or audit can be in practice [4] [8].
6. What transparency reports don’t solve: technical limits and remaining trust gaps
Transparency reports and audits document requests and policies but cannot magically eliminate all surveillance vectors — VPNs can reduce what is available to hand over, but they cannot fully anonymize users or make them immune to lawful data collection from ISPs, endpoints, or other parties, a limitation emphasized by privacy researchers and advocacy groups [8] [9]. That technical and legal reality explains why readers are urged to weigh reports, audits, server architecture, and jurisdiction together rather than relying on any single claim [3] [2].