First Thoughts on CyberGhost VPN

VPN
1

Went with their $35 for three years of premium deal. I tested for DNS leaks and haven’t found any yet. They offer AES-256 bit encryption (I think) and OpenVPN protocol, both that are green flags for me. My major use for a VPN is (legal) file-sharing with a group of my friends over torrents.

Speed: I cannot explain this. It’s fast considering my internet connection (Max 50mb(its)/s, average though is usually 20mb/s). I’m located in California, US, and I connect to their Toronto, Canada server. Here are the results of the speed: http://imgur.com/a/BMcEO

The top (AT&T) is without the VPN and the bottom (Amanah) is WITH the VPN. I have tested the speeds several times, and this is very consistent. I understand VPNs don’t necessarily make the connection faster, since it’s an extra step in the process, but it shows as a faster connection. Maybe the test servers have something to do with this (any explanation or help in diagnosing why would be appreciated).

I have not contacted customer support yet, so can’t comment on that. The client they supply is more beautiful than it is functional in SOME respects; this surrounds what type of encryption you can use (I don’t see options to change this) and protocol choice (Same again, OpenVPN-only I think). Also, do they have a killswitch? Not sure. However, right now the speeds on my file-sharing to friends is really slow; Im uploading to them at only 10 KB(ytes)/s when average used to be 1.7 MB(ytes)/s. Even without the VPN it’s this slow, so it must be the heat (95-103 degrees F, when it gets hotter connections get slower for some reason, it’s typical for summer).

EDIT: Found out my client settings were set to limit bandwidth to Max 10KB/s. To see my speed results, check out the little experiment and comparison I made with NordVPN, Cyberghost VPN, and a control test (without any VPN).

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1JrdLTuEr9hwYfC0Sw7tMfp2CfLX9Eq3tz2Py7a3_t48/edit?usp=sharing

 

Any other questions about Cyberghost VPN are welcomed and appreciated. I am willing to provide many more tests upon requests—if you aren’t satisfied with this review, recommend a test and I’ll post back results. Thank you for checking this out.

UPDATE 6/23/16:
CyberGhost has been treating me well; no bad experiences, and no DNS leaks that I’ve found yet, though I’m not checking for that very often anymore. However, their windows client hasn’t exactly been perfect. It pops up with an error about initial connection failing, but the second try works. Today, just got a notification as I was updating the client (it asked me to) that the CG network adapter couldn’t be used or wasn’t working. Dunno what that was about, but service still seems to work. Happy as I can be about it, though I’ll probe into the issues to see what I can do.

2

Don’t use their “privacy features” they install an SSL root cert and open you up to MITM attacks.

3

Speeds were so slow yesterday because the client was set to a max download speed was 10KB/s. . .
Sorry everyone—speed is now up to where it should be, post has been edited to show.

4

how many Simultaneous use on devices are allowed?

5

Huh, didn’t know that. My subscription is almost up, guess I’m switching vpns.

6

Ah, okay, thank you for that. Looking up how to uninstall/delete all remnants of that SSL cert right now.

7

If these features could do harm to us,why would they implement them at the first place?

8

Is this the same with the privacy services PIA has? Blocking ads etc.?

9

Good question. I was sort of bummed out by their system. It’s more secure I guess, but also more limited.

Short answer: 1 for their premium package, 5 for their premium “plus” package (Plus, AFAIK and have seen, only has the advantage of more devices, not necessarily more servers or faster speeds).

However, instead of “simultaneous devices,” they employ a registration method, where you tie a computer or device to the account and that counts as one device regardless of whether the VPN is on or not. You may change devices through their online website, WHICH isn’t hard or difficult; it’s rather easy and a simple click, but really: that’s more inconvenient than an actual “simultaneous device” method.

Did I answer your question adequately?

10

thanks, was hoping for multiple devices, more like cellphone and computer.

11

Yeah, if you wish to get around it, you could route your router to direct all traffic to go through the VPN, but that obviously limits your mobility.

The best of luck to you