The temporary solution to this significant leak issue offered by Avast VPN is to “protect your privacy in the meantime by blocking or disabling WebRTC manually.” Still, it can cause severe privacy and security issues. WebRTC (Web Real-Time Communication) is a built-in browser feature enabled by default in some of the major browsers like Firefox, Chrome, and Opera. In other words, this isn’t Avast VPN’s problem. While the service offers reliable IP and DNS leak protection, WebRTC leaks are another matter. For this reason, I’ll put it out there now – Avast SecureLine VPN is not a product I’d recommend purchasing.
Put simply, anyone who has ever had any Avast product had their data sold. It was revealed quite recently that the company was scanning its users’ devices, collecting data, and later selling it through its subsidiary, Jumpshot. Moreover, Avast VPN has even more stains on its reputation when it comes to keeping its users’ data private. Even though Avast VPN logs an anonymized version of your IP, there can only be 256 versions of the last octet, and pairing that with the VPN server you’ve been using might give just enough to identify you.
To be precise, a user’s real IP address was linked to an email account. Avast VPN proved to be helpful in one case, where personally identifiable information was provided to the Czech police. It will also hand over data to other third parties “if we believe on the advice of our attorneys that we are required to respond.” And it routinely transfers personal data to contractors for “product development or market research.”Īvast SecureLine VPN logs timestamps, your IP address (minus the last 4 digits), and the IPs of VPN servers you connect toĪccording to the Avast Transparency Report 2017, over that year the company received 28 log disclosure requests from authorities in different countries. In fact, it’s pretty weak when it comes to protecting user identity.įor instance, Avast won’t just surrender personally-identifiable data to legitimate requests from law enforcement bodies. The company also admits to not having many protections against official agencies. But it does suggest that Avast is collecting plenty of information at other times, and the company isn’t as open as it could be about exactly how it does this. None of this proves that Avast keeps detailed logs of customer activity when they log onto the VPN. Having said that, the data collected won’t be used for marketing purposes unless you “opt in” – which is a welcome inclusion. The policy continues, noting that “the system may store data on the bandwidth transferred per session.” The use of words like “may” is not something we feel good about in the context of a privacy policy.įinally, Avast will keep records of your interactions with their support team, including “personally identifiable information.” Officially, this is intended to make their support operations run more smoothly, but it might reasonably spook some users. The problem is that Avast doesn’t say what it will do with this data, or what it would do if law enforcement agencies requested it. And as they say, all of this data is deleted within 30 days.
This is a somewhat vague clause but isn’t necessarily worrying in itself (for instance, if Avast only records the type of computer connecting to their servers). However, let’s have a closer look at what the Avast privacy policy actually says about logging.Īvast SecureLine VPN privacy policy states that when you start up SecureLine, Avast “may capture certain basic data such as the time and network location from which the VPN connection was made and the duration of the VPN connection.” Does Avast VPN keep logs?Īvast SecureLine front page states that the VPN “doesn’t log websites visited or app usage.” So, on the face of things, there seems to be no issue of Avast VPN logs. Hence you’re not getting as much as you would by subscribing to some of the premium VPNs. For instance, functionalities like split tunneling, or Tor over VPN are not included. In terms of security, here’s what Avast SecureLine VPN has to offer: When choosing a VPN, staying secure and private should be your top priority.
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