45K Signatures Collected Against Netflix' VPN Crackdown by NordVPN and Open Media

New York, New York, May 13, 2016 (Newswire.com) - Open Media, an Internet advocacy group, published an open letter this week to Netflix CEO Reed Hastings. The letter says: “VPNs are one of the best and most accessible tools that Internet users have to protect our privacy. Whether it's from malicious criminal activities, government surveillance and censorship, or simply connecting to a weakly-secured hotel Wi-Fi system, our personal and private digital information is constantly being put at risk and made vulnerable online.”

There are also countries where a lot of Internet content is blocked by “governments trying to control what their citizens can and cannot access.”

VPNs protect users from online threats, and can potentially save lives in authoritarian countries.

Marty P. Kamden, CMO of NordVPN

In all these cases, VPNs are crucial for Internet freedom, privacy, and in cases with repressive governments, VPNs could perhaps save lives by providing anonymity to journalists and activists (in such cases, as recent killings of bloggers in Bangladesh or sentencing of a blogger in Saudi Arabia).

NordVPN supports this stance of Open Media, and has established its own Emergency VPN program, freely available to those who need online privacy and security in case of emergency, under extreme duress or threat of physical danger.

Responding to Mr. Hastings statement that VPN users are “a very small but quite vocal minority,” Open Media says: “We are not small, and we’re not insignificant – but you did get one thing right: we are vocal. And we think it’s important that our voices be heard. So far nearly 45,000 people have joined our campaign asking you to not block pro-privacy VPN technology.”

NordVPN directly participates in the call to sign the petition. 

Finally, NordVPN and Open Media agree that Netflix is an advanced streaming service and “we love their services.” There should be a better way, however, to solve licensing issues than blocking VPNs and privacy that they provide.

NordVPN still works with Netflix. Users are invited to speak with support to find workaround options.

Source: NordVPN