NSA PRISM Spying Scandal Influences VPN Sign Ups—Big Time!

A recent survey of over a thousand people indicates that the biggest influence on new VPN sign-ups has been the PRISM scandal and Edward Snowden’s revelations about the scope of NSA spying. Participants in the survey were asked if recent legislation or other political elements influenced them to sign up for a Virtual Private network service.

The options for these privacy-affecting political items could not be comprehensive by the survey’s nature, but still, the results were intriguing. PRISM and the National Security Agency were by far the biggest influence, with 28.08% of voters indicating that it contributed to or directly caused their signing up for a VPN service. No other piece of legislation even broke twelve percent of voters, with the United States Patriot Act and the EU Data Retention Directive a distant second and third place at, respectively, 11.28% and 9.57%.

This suggestion is supported by a massive increase in subscriptions, page views, and unique visitors to VPN sites in the two months—June and July of 2013—after the PRISM news broke on June 6th. In comparison to April and May, VPN signups increased by more than 50%. The count of unique visitors went up by more than 15 percent, and page views increased by nearly 30 percent.

The survey’s full results went as follows:

Which of these most influenced your decision to sign up for a VPN service?

·      PRISM revelations: 28.06%

·      The EU Data Retention Directive: 9.57%

·      The CCDP (‘Snooper’s Charter): 2.37%

·      SOPA: 8.44%

·      ACTA: 2.84%

·      TPP: 2.37%

·      The Patriot Act: 11.28%

·      CISPA: 8.34%

·      Other: 6.26%

·      None: 20.47%

The second most influential piece of legislation on VPN signups was the United States Patriot Act at 11.3%. This controversial act has recently been in the news again, due to some people alleging that it allowed PRISM’s operation without openly breaking any United States laws.

After the Patriot Act was the European Union’s Data Retention Directive, with just under ten percent of the vote. The EU Data Retention Directive was legalized in 2006, and it requires all European Internet Service Providers to store their user’s data, including web logs, for the user’s entire subscription and up to two years after they stop subscribing.

After the Data Retention Directive came SOPA, the United States bill that became an Internet flashpoint. Given the sheer quantity of fury that surrounded SOPA before it was defeated, it seems strange that it only received 8.4% of the vote! The similar CISPA (which is now shelved) followed SOPA in votes.

Quite a lot of people voted for “none of the above” (20 percent) or “other” (6 percent). This suggests that a lot of people were effected by various issues that were not included by our survey. These options allowed surveyed individuals to submit their personal reasons for signing up; the results from this were quite mixed.

Many people mentioned DMCA notices; others brought up access to secure WiFi hotspots. Also prominent were pieces of legislation from countries that were not mentioned, such as Norway, Brazil, and even Russia; this does expose an element of United States/United Kingdom centric nature to the survey.

Using a VPN to avoid PRISM’s watchful eye won’t do as much as you may think, technically; using a VPN, or even the TOR browser, will not stop the NSA from reading your email or your web history. On the other hand, the coverage PRISM has received has brought the thought of online surveillance very much into the public eye—more so than previous scandals and controversies have. It’s not surprising that PRISM and the NSA have increased VPN usage as much as they have, but it does still indicate that savvy internet users are taking their online privacy more seriously than ever before.

If a you need to protect your online browsing and privacy, try a top rated vpn service.