US Democrats have just urged the Federal Trade Commission to crack down on deceptive practices being used by the VPN industry right now. In an open letter, Rep. Anna Eshoo and Senator Ron Wyden Sighted research indicating that Most popular VPNs “misrepresented their products”, leading customers to a false sense of security. This news comes after the wake of the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe V Wade, allowing states to ban abortion rights leading people to sign up for VPN services but they expressed concerns about the privacy level that they can expect from these VPN companies promising total safety and masking from anyone out there.
They said, “Advocacy groups have… found that leading VPN services intentionally misrepresent the functionality of their product and fail to provide adequate security to their users, We’re highly concerned that this deceptive advertising is giving abortion-seekers a false sense of security when searching for abortion-related care or information, putting them at a higher risk of prosecution.”
The open letter notes that there is a lack of practical tools to audit security claims made by these VPN providers. That allows them to advertise data that might be incorrect. They also ask the Federal Trade Commission to develop a brochure informing anyone seeking an abortion about online privacy and the risks and benefits of using any VPN service out there.
According to the letter, “With abortion illegal or soon to be illegal in 13 states and severely restricted in many more, these abusive and exploitative data practices are simply unacceptable, we urge the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to take immediate action… to curtail abusive and deceptive data practices in companies providing VPN services to protect internet users seeking abortions.”
