from Hacker News

VPN firm says it didn't know customers had lifetime subscriptions, cancels them

by maxloh on 5/14/25, 6:48 AM with 30 comments

• by cookiengineer on 5/14/25, 8:03 AM

  > The message noted that VPNSecure was acquired in 2023, “including the technology, domain, and customer database—but not the liabilities.”

  Next time you see a cop on the street, you should say that you didn't purchase the liabilities when you bought drugs around the corner.

  How is this not prosecuted immediately?

• by phyzix5761 on 5/14/25, 7:50 AM

  When you buy a company you buy all of its contractual obligations. You don't get to choose to not honor some of them without legal repercussions.

• by tuga2099 on 5/14/25, 8:31 AM

  Get away from lifetime deals of services that have monthly spendings, like VPN providers, that pay for dedicated servers and bandwidth on a monthly basis.

• by jmclnx on 5/14/25, 2:05 PM

  Lifetime subscriptions cost just $40 ? That really rings the "to good to be true" bell. Why would a VPN company do that. I have seen deals like this for 5 years, but not lifetime.

  Anyway I wonder what the EUL said, was there tiny print that stated something like "we can cancel your subscription at any time" or maybe "after X years of use or non-use" ?

• by ChrisArchitect on 5/14/25, 2:44 PM

  Some related discussion on a submission from a customer a few weeks ago:

  VPNSecure deactivated all lifetime subscribers

  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43865593

• by mattio on 5/14/25, 8:10 AM

  The company must remain profitable, otherwise it will bankrupt, right. I wonder what a better path forward was. Perhaps their T&C allow to lower through put of the LT-subscriptions and offer an upgrade to breakeven on LT-subs.