{"id":24545,"date":"2021-10-10T13:24:15","date_gmt":"2021-10-10T20:24:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.podfeet.com\/blog\/?p=24545"},"modified":"2021-10-10T16:12:18","modified_gmt":"2021-10-10T23:12:18","slug":"encrypt-me-strongvpn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.podfeet.com\/blog\/2021\/10\/encrypt-me-strongvpn\/","title":{"rendered":"Encrypt.me VPN Is Under New Ownership"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Encrypt
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Long time NosillaCastaway John Shaffer wrote in what he called a Dumb Question a few weeks ago that caught me by surprise. He told me that the VPN service Encrypt.me was combining with one called StrongVPN. He wondered how the change was going to affect the commitment to privacy and security.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been using Encrypt.me since it was called Cloak, so for at least 15 years and I’ve been a big proponent of it on the podcast. My loyalty to Encrypt.me is so strong that for the roughly 18 months I didn\u2019t leave my house, I kept paying for Encrypt.me because I wanted them to stay in business and still be around when I poked my nose out of the front door. This news from John that they\u2019d combined with StrongVPN was news to me and like John, I was very interested in the future of this product.<\/p>\n

I made some inquiries and engaged in a video teleconference with two representatives for StrongVPN. I spoke to Subbu Sthanu, VP of Consumer Product Strategy, and Erjona Asllani, VPN Product Management & Product Marketing. They each brought different perspectives that provided a good background on what has happened so far and where they see the future product development going.<\/p>\n

Before I get into any details of the future, the main takeaway from our conversation is that Encrypt will stay in place for current customers for the foreseeable future, but new customers will be directed towards StrongVPN. I believe they really will keep Encrypt around for a fairly long time, and I\u2019ll elaborate on why I believe them.<\/p>\n

Background<\/h2>\n

The biggest thing I didn\u2019t understand coming into this blind is that there have been a lot<\/em> of mergers and acquisitions over time. I didn\u2019t know that Encrypt had been bought by J2 Global over two years ago. Subbu described a series of VPN-owning company mergers, and I won\u2019t even attempt to replicate how we got here, but J2 Global just<\/em> changed its name to Ziff Davis<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now that we have a name for the company that owns Encrypt I can explain why you care if you care about Encrypt. Ziff-Davis now has a portfolio of VPN tools<\/a> with an array of capabilities from end users who simply want to protect their web traffic when in a coffee shop to higher-level capabilities such as threat intelligence and analysis, security and backup for businesses and more. Subbu emphasized that they\u2019re all about privacy and security. I think at this point, John\u2019s original question about whether the new stewards of Encrypt would continue the commitment to security and privacy was answered.<\/p>\n

I asked Subbu whether we could end up in a situation like what Dropbox did to its customers. Dropbox won the Internet\u2019s love by letting us store our data in a cloud service that synced to all of our devices. But then they got more aspirational and started trying to force more capabilities on us, creating a bloated app and providing services many didn\u2019t need or want.<\/p>\n

Subbu had a great answer. He explained that while they will be consolidating their end-user VPN tools from three down to one, they are committed to serving this specific market while advancing their broader tools for the business customer.<\/p>\n

The three VPN tools they own now are Encrypt, IP Vanish, and StrongVPN. Subbu explained these three brands:<\/p>\n