VPN providers
Obscura privacy rating
VPN from Sovereign Engineering Inc. in the United States that sends WireGuard traffic over QUIC through its own relay to Mullvad exit servers, so neither party sees both the user and the traffic. Accounts are a random number.
Summary
Obscura scores 60 out of 100 (grade C) on the VPN providers criteria. It meets 6 of 13 criteria: no trackers or telemetry, no ads or data sales, TLS configuration, anonymous payment, open-source apps and modern protocols. It partly meets open source and audited no-logs policy. It does not meet independent audit, transparency report, tells users about requests, security headers and modern web standards. It is based in the United States: Five Eyes member; subject to the US CLOUD Act. Automated tests: SSL Labs grade A, Mozilla HTTP Observatory grade C+ and Internet.nl website score 64%.
Score 60 out of 100. How scoring works
Criteria
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Partial
Open source Weight 3 of 3
Is all the source code needed to run the product public?
The client apps are open source under GPL-3.0. The relay servers are not.
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Yes
No trackers or telemetry Weight 3 of 3
Are the website and apps free of third-party trackers, with any analytics anonymous and any telemetry off by default?
No third-party trackers. Plausible analytics are cookieless and aggregate-only.
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Yes
No ads or data sales Weight 2 of 3
Is the product funded without advertising, ad targeting or selling user data?
Funded by paid subscriptions. No ads.
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No
Independent audit Weight 2 of 3
Has an independent security or privacy audit been published within the last three years?
No independent audit is published.
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No
Transparency report Weight 2 of 3
Does the provider regularly publish how many government and legal requests it receives and how it responds?
No transparency report or government request policy is published.
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No
Tells users about requests Weight 1 of 3
Does the provider promise to tell users about requests for their data, unless a court forbids it?
No published policy on notifying users about data requests.
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Partial
Audited no-logs policy Weight 3 of 3
Has an independent audit confirmed that activity and connection logs are not kept?
The policy states IP addresses are not logged or stored, and the two-party relay design limits what each party sees. Not audited.
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Yes
Anonymous payment Weight 2 of 3
Can an account be created and paid for without an email address, name or card?
Accounts are a random number with no email, and Monero and Bitcoin over Lightning are accepted.
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Yes
Open-source apps Weight 2 of 3
Are the apps for every platform open source?
The repository holds the apps for macOS, iOS, Android, Windows and Linux under GPL-3.0.
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Yes
Modern protocols Weight 1 of 3
Is WireGuard (or another modern audited protocol) supported?
WireGuard is used, carried over QUIC.
Automated tests
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Yes
TLS configuration Weight 2 of 3
Does the website pass the Qualys SSL Labs test with a grade of A or better?
Grade A
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No
Security headers Weight 1 of 3
Does the website pass the Mozilla HTTP Observatory test with a grade of A or better?
Grade C+ (60/100+)
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No
Modern web standards Weight 1 of 3
Does the website score 90% or higher on the Internet.nl website test?
Score 64%