Who Owns Your VPN? The Complete 2026 Guide

When you install a VPN, you are routing every byte of your internet traffic through someone else's servers. Your browsing history, your search queries, your banking sessions, your private messages — all of it passes through infrastructure controlled by the company behind that VPN.

So the question is not whether a VPN encrypts your traffic. Any reputable VPN does that. The question is: who owns the company you are trusting with all of it?

The two corporations that control most of the VPN market

The consumer VPN industry is dominated by two corporate groups. Between them, they own the majority of the VPN brands you have heard of — and, critically, many of the review sites that recommend those brands.

Kape Technologies

Kape Technologies was previously known as Crossrider. Under that name, the company was flagged by UC Berkeley and Google as a major distributor of ad-injection software — programs that insert unwanted advertisements into users' browsers without their knowledge.

In 2018, Crossrider rebranded to Kape Technologies and began acquiring VPN companies:

• — ZenMate — acquired in 2018
• — Private Internet Access (PIA) — acquired in 2019
• — CyberGhost — acquired in 2017
• — ExpressVPN — acquired in 2021 for $936 million

In 2023, Kape Technologies was taken private by Unikmind Holdings, removing it from public stock exchange reporting requirements.

But the acquisitions do not stop at VPN products. Kape also owns:

• — vpnMentor — one of the most widely read VPN review sites
• — Wizcase — another major VPN review and comparison site

Kape Technologies owns both the VPN products and the review sites that rank those products first. This is not speculation. It is documented corporate ownership.

Nord Security

Nord Security is the parent company behind NordVPN, one of the most heavily marketed VPN brands in the world. In 2022, Nord Security and Surfshark merged under the same corporate umbrella. The merger was not disclosed on either product's consumer-facing homepage at the time.

Nord Security's VPN portfolio:

• — NordVPN — the flagship product
• — Surfshark — merged in 2022
• — Atlas VPN — acquired in 2023

When NordVPN and Surfshark appear as separate competitors on review sites, they are in fact controlled by the same company. When a reviewer recommends "switching from NordVPN to Surfshark," they may not realize they are recommending the same parent company.

Why ownership matters more than features

Every VPN comparison page focuses on the same things: server count, speed tests, protocol support, price. These are real considerations. But they are secondary to a more fundamental question.

Does the company that controls your VPN have a business model that conflicts with your privacy?

A company that was previously in the ad-injection business now controls four major VPN brands and the review sites that evaluate them. That is not a technical problem. It is a structural one.

A company that merges two of its VPN brands without disclosing it on either product's homepage is making a choice about transparency. That choice tells you something about how they view their relationship with users.

The free VPN problem

The ownership problem is even more acute in the free VPN market. Research by the Tech Transparency Project found that 1 in 5 of the top 100 free VPN apps on Apple's US App Store are secretly owned by Chinese companies, with over 70 million combined downloads. Some of these trace back to Qihoo 360, a company designated by the US government as a Chinese military company.

If you are using a free VPN and you cannot explain how it makes money, you should assume the product is you.

What to look for in a VPN company

When evaluating any VPN — including ours — ask these questions:

• — Who owns this company? Is the parent company named on the website? Can you find the actual corporate owner?
• — Has the company changed hands? Acquisitions are common in this industry. The VPN you signed up for three years ago may now be owned by a completely different entity.
• — Does the company also own review sites? If the company that makes the VPN also controls the sites that rank VPNs, that is a conflict of interest worth knowing about.
• — How does the free tier make money? If the VPN is free and there are no ads, the business model is either subsidized by paid users or it is something else entirely.
• — Is there a warrant canary? A warrant canary is a public statement confirming the company has not received government demands for user data. Its removal is the signal that something has changed.

Where PlanckVPN stands

We built PlanckVPN because we could not find a VPN we trusted. Not because of features — because of ownership.

PlanckVPN has no parent company. No holding corporation. No investors with a conflicting business model. The company is fully owned by its founder, and that founder's name, face, and story are public.

We are smaller than NordVPN. We have fewer servers than ExpressVPN. We have not been audited five times like NordVPN has. These are honest limitations and we state them clearly on our comparison page.

What we do have: independence, a warrant canary updated every 90 days, renewal pricing that does not change, and a free tier whose business model — ads via Google AdMob — is disclosed openly.

We are not asking you to take our word for it. We are asking you to look at who owns the tools you trust with your privacy — and decide for yourself.

Sources

• — Google Security Blog — "Ad Injection at Scale: Assessing Deceptive Advertisement Modifications" (2015)
• — BusinessWire — Kape Technologies acquires ExpressVPN for $936M (September 2021)
• — BusinessWire — Kape Technologies acquires Private Internet Access for $95.5M (November 2019)
• — Investegate — Proposed Acquisition of Private Internet Access
• — TechRadar — Kape signs $150M deal for vpnMentor and Wizcase (Webselenese acquisition)
• — Perivan — Unikmind Holdings closes cash offer for Kape Technologies ($1.58B valuation)
• — Investegate — Kape Technologies take-private announcement
• — PR Newswire — Nord Security and Surfshark merge (February 2022)
• — Nord Security — Announcement on Atlas VPN shutdown
• — Cybernews Editorial Policy — disclosure of Nord Security founders as investors
• — Tech Transparency Project — Apple offers apps with ties to Chinese military (70M+ downloads)
• — Federal Register — Addition of Qihoo 360 to Commerce Department Entity List (June 2020)
• — US Department of Defense — Chinese Military Company list (January 2025)
• — Tech Transparency Project — Spot check: Apple and Google still have a Chinese VPN problem (May 2025)