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A reviewer asked PrivateVPN’s support why the company has never published an audit. The reply, as reported: “there is nothing to audit since we do not store logs.”
An audit exists to check exactly that claim. So the answer assumes the conclusion it is meant to support. The same reviewer asked whether the servers are RAM-based. The answer was no, with no explanation of how the company enforces the policy.
Is PrivateVPN Any Good?
For streaming on a budget, yes. Reviewers report Netflix, iPlayer, Disney+ and Prime Video working reliably. And the long plan drops to around $2 a month.
Port forwarding comes at no extra cost, which is unusual now. One plan includes a free dedicated IP address, and ten devices connect at once.
⚠️ For privacy, no. Seventeen years of operation and no independent audit. Disk-based servers rather than RAM-only. Sweden sits inside the Fourteen Eyes arrangement.
The Support Answer, and Why It Matters
The reply inverts the purpose of an audit. A no-logs claim is an assertion. An audit is an outside party checking whether the assertion holds.
So “nothing to audit” is the claim restated. It cannot also be the evidence — which is the distinction our page on no-logs claims turns on.
⚠️ And the second answer undercuts the first. Disk-based servers retain data across a reboot by design. RAM-only infrastructure exists precisely so that nothing survives one.
None of that makes the company dishonest. Nobody has ever attached an incident to it. But a claim with no verification and no architecture behind it is the weakest form available.
Where Published Accounts Disagree
This provider produced more source conflicts than any we have reviewed. So we are listing them rather than resolving them.
One source states the no-logs policy is “audited by independent firms.” Every other account says no audit exists. The provider’s own support says the same. Notably, the outlier also gives the highest score.
Accounts also differ on ownership. Most accounts name Privat Kommunikation Sverige AB and call the company independent. One reports that the hosting group Miss Group bought it in 2022.
⚠️ And the speed figures range widely. One test reports 300 Mbps. Another reports losses of 35 to 50%. A third ranks the provider twenty-second of thirty.
The Jurisdiction, Which Cuts Both Ways
Sweden belongs to the Fourteen Eyes arrangement. That is the standard criticism, and it is accurate.
But Sweden is also Mullvad’s home. Police searched Mullvad’s office in 2023 and left with nothing. That tested the architecture rather than the paperwork.
⚠️ PrivateVPN has had no such test. No known law-enforcement demand, and no public event to examine. Absence of a failed test is not a passed one.
And the Swedish framework keeps moving. Our Sweden page covers the device-access powers, which reach before encryption rather than through it.
What It Costs
Around $2 a month on the three-year plan, with a thirty-day money-back guarantee. That is among the cheapest reputable options.
⚠️ Check the renewal before committing to three years. The renewal figure decides the total, and a long term locks the introductory rate only for its duration.
The free dedicated IP is a genuine differentiator. Most providers charge extra — though a static address cuts against anonymity rather than for it.
Test inside the window. Streaming access shifts without notice, and cancelling and claiming a refund are two separate actions.
Everything Else, Briefly
Network: around 200 servers across 63 countries. Small, and concentrated in the United Kingdom and the United States.
Protocols: WireGuard, OpenVPN and IKEv2, with AES-256. A Stealth mode provides obfuscation — a feature nobody independently tests, at any provider.
Torrenting: permitted, with port forwarding and SOCKS5 support. That combination puts it in a shrinking group — as our torrenting guide explains.
The interface draws consistent criticism as dated, and live chat is not staffed around the clock.
Mullvad operates from the same country and publishes an audit every year — same country, opposite evidence.
| Provider | No-logs audits | Auditor | Jurisdiction |
|---|---|---|---|
| NordVPN | 6 | PwC, Deloitte | Panama |
| Surfshark | 2 | Deloitte | Netherlands (9 Eyes) |
| ExpressVPN | 3 | KPMG | British Virgin Islands, Kape-owned |
| CyberGhost | 3 | Deloitte | Romania, Kape-owned |
| PureVPN | 4 | KPMG | BVI, operated from Pakistan |
| IPVanish | 2 | Leviathan, Schellman | United States (Five Eyes), Ziff Davis-owned |
| Windscribe | 1 | Packetlabs, production infrastructure | Canada (Five Eyes); Greek case dismissed, no data to give |
| Proton VPN | 5 | Securitum | Switzerland, moving infrastructure to EU |
| Private Internet Access | 3 | Deloitte | United States (Five Eyes), Kape-owned |
| Mullvad | 10+ | Cure53, Assured AB | Sweden (14 Eyes) |
| TunnelBear | Annual since 2017 | Cure53 | Canada (Five Eyes), US parent |
| Norton VPN | 2 | VerSprite | United States (Five Eyes) |
| Hotspot Shield | 0 | protocol audited, policy not | United States (Five Eyes) |
| AirVPN | 0 | none — the client is open source instead | Italy (14 Eyes) |
| IVPN | 8, annual since inception | Cure53 | Gibraltar (status disputed) |
| Hide.me | 1 modern, in 2024 | Securitum, though one source names Altius IT | Malaysia (outside the alliances) |
| PrivadoVPN | 0 | none in six years of operation | Iceland (moved from Switzerland, 2026) |
| TorGuard | 0 | none; settled a lawsuit without disclosing records | United States (Five Eyes) |
| FastestVPN | 1, in 2023 | Altius IT | Cayman Islands (outside the alliances) |
| StrongVPN | 0 | none in over two decades | United States (Five Eyes), Ziff Davis-owned |
| VyprVPN | 1, in 2018 | Leviathan Security, before the 2023 sale | United States (Five Eyes), Certida-owned since 2023 |
| PrivateVPN | 0 | none; support says there is nothing to audit | Sweden (14 Eyes), ownership disputed |
| ZoogVPN | 0 | none; support describes one as planned | Greece (outside the alliances), run from Ukraine |
Who It Is For
Take it for streaming on a small budget. It unblocks the major platforms, costs very little on a long term, and throws in a dedicated IP.
Take it for torrenting, with care. Port forwarding at no extra cost is genuinely useful, and increasingly rare.
⚠️ Do not take it for the privacy claim. Our privacy ranking excludes unaudited providers, and the support answer is a reason rather than a technicality.
How We Research
For the support exchange about the missing audit and the disk-based servers, this review draws on Wizcase, which reported both answers. For the absence of any audit, the server count, the Swedish jurisdiction and the feature set, it draws on Cybernews, All Things VPN, ip-trackers, VPN Leaderboard and two further published reviews. One source states the policy is audited by independent firms, which contradicts every other account and the provider’s own support. We have said so rather than choosing. Sources report ownership two ways, and we give both. Speed figures range from 300 Mbps to losses of half, so we have not adopted any single number. We do not run our own tests. Our method lives on the About Us page.
PrivateVPN FAQ
No. Published accounts agree it has never commissioned an independent audit, and its own support confirmed that when asked. One outlier source claims the policy is audited by independent firms, which contradicts everything else including the company.
A reviewer reported the reply as there being nothing to audit, since no logs are stored. An audit exists to verify precisely that claim, so the answer restates the assertion rather than supporting it. Support also said the servers are not RAM-based.
Yes, and it is the main reason to consider it. Published reviews report reliable access to Netflix, BBC iPlayer, Disney+ and Prime Video despite a network of only around 200 servers. Harder platforms are less consistent.
Sweden belongs to the Fourteen Eyes arrangement, which is the standard criticism. However, Mullvad operates from the same country and had its office searched in 2023 without producing anything. Jurisdiction matters less than whether records exist.
Around $2 a month on the longest plan, which is among the cheapest reputable options, with a thirty-day money-back guarantee. Port forwarding costs nothing extra and one plan comes with a free dedicated IP address.
PrivateVPN
The Verdict
Reliable streaming, port forwarding at no extra cost, a free dedicated IP on one plan, ten devices and around $2 a month on a long term. Against that: no independent audit in seventeen years, disk-based rather than RAM-only servers, a Fourteen Eyes jurisdiction, a dated interface, and a support answer that treats the no-logs claim as its own evidence.
Final Verdict
The product is better than the privacy story. It streams well, it costs little, and it includes features that larger providers charge for or have dropped.
The privacy story is one sentence long. Asked why there is no audit, support said there is nothing to audit — which is the claim, not the proof.
And the sources cannot agree on the basics. Whether it has been audited, who owns it, and how fast it is all come in two versions. We have given both of each.