ExpressVPN is following in the footsteps of popular VPN brands like Private Internet Access, CyberGhost VPN, Proton VPN, and by publishing transparency reports.
“By publishing this additional information on the requests that we receive, we aim to provide even more transparency into how we protect our users, day in and day out,” ExpressVPN said.
These reports detail the number of requests for user data the company has received as well as the number of requests it has complied with.
The reports are very easy to read as they are short and organized in a chart. The requests are categorized into five types of requests: Government and/or police requests, DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) requests, Warrants from any government institution, Gag orders, and National Security Letters.
Its first report shows 152,847 requests from July 2023 to December 2023, the bulk of which were DMCA requests, which is a US copyright law that was passed in 1998. The report states that ExpressVPN complied with 0 requests, which is expected given its firm stance on user privacy:
“We do not and never will keep logs of your online activities or personal information, including your browsing history, traffic destination or metadata, DNS queries, or any IP addresses you are assigned when you connect to our VPN,” stated ExpressVPN.
ExpressVPN will release a new transparency report every 6 months so users can learn about the data user requests biannually and stay up-to-date regarding the protection of their data and internet activity. You can view the transparency report in ExpressVPN’s Trust Centre here.
Private Internet Access and CyberGhost VPN both release their transparency reports every quarter, while Proton VPN updates its transparency report page “whenever there is a notable new legal request. This post was last updated on August 29, 2023”, according to Proton VPN’s website.