Ivacy Review – Bestvpn.com

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Features

Ivacy allows users to connect to five devices at once using the same account. Although fast becoming the industry standard, we still consider this to be a VPN-capable device at all times.

This provider also offers very generous 550+ servers in 100+ locations in 50+ countries around the world. This includes locations often overlooked by VPN companies, such as South and Central America and Africa.

These servers are a mix of bare metal and much less software-based VPS solutions on shared servers, but unlike many VPN services. Bare metal servers if privacy is a high priority for you.

P2P torrenting is not only permitted, but Ivacy offers optimized P2P servers which provides the best seeds for filesharing.

Split-tunneling

And use the VPN tunnel, and to exclude the rest. Split tunneling is very useful if you only need the VPN for certain reasons.

You can, for example, route all Chrome traffic through the VPN in order to access Netflix and torrent sites, while using Firefox without the VPN for your daily internet needs. This is a great feature, so it's a bit of a shame that it's only currently available to Windows and Android users.

Dedicated IP addresses

Ivacy can provide subscribers with dedicated static IP addresses. IPs will be blacklisted. These are useful for accessing streaming services. Triggering irritating captchas on websites.

Users must, however, pay an additional $ 1.99 per month for this add-on feature. It is also worth noting that it is a private IP address. But you can use the dedicated IP only when you want to, and connect to shared servers when you want more privacy.

Secure downloading

This unusual feature automatically scans all downloads with "advanced server level virus and malware protection." We have no idea how effective this is at catching viruses, and would certainly not advocate. That said, an additional layer of malware can only be good in our book.

NAT firewall and port forwarding

Many VPN services offer a NAT firewall as standard, although this can be a mixed blessing. A VPN NAT firewall runs on the VPN servers and tries to protect users from hackers by unsolicited new connections.

P2P torrenting because it removes the sharing aspect from filesharing. It also makes games and media severs, plus LAN resources such as printers and hard drives, inaccessible from behind to VPN connection.

The solution to this is port forwarding through the firewall in order to allow incoming connections to be initiated. Please see What is a NAT Firewall? and our VPN Port Forwarding Guide for more information on this subject.

Ivacy offers NAT firewall with port forwarding as an add-on feature for an additional $ 1 per month. Note that port forwarding is redundant without a NAT firewall, as it simply is not needed.

Is the lack of a firewall? In our experience probably not, although the threat is hard to quantify. On the other hand, providing NAT firewall but no port forwarding solution (as many other providers) can be very frustrating for torrenters and those who need to access resources behind the VPN connection …

Netflix and iPlayer Unblocking

We are impressed to note that we are using our benchmark US Netflix and BBC iPlayer streaming services. It should be effective at unblocking many others.

It should also be noted that if any services proves to be difficult to access.

Please also check out our Best VPNs for Netflix and Best VPNs for BBC iPlayer articles if accessing these services is important to you.

Speed ​​and Performance

We have only just started speed testing. Ivacy, I am not sure how we represent the speed of time. What we have seen so far, however, is very impressive.

Indeed with a Weighted Speed ​​Test Result of 81.08 Mbits / s and Max Speed ​​/ Burst Result of 258.28 Mbits / s, Ivacy is currently the fastest VPN service on our books. It will be possible to keep this level of performance over an extended period of testing.

Ivory's DNS lookup times Average 0.61 seconds and Max 1.95, while connection times Average 5.2 seconds and Max 6.0 seconds. All of which is about average for VPN services.

IP leak tests

We ran DNS and WebRTC leak tests using Ivacy's Windows and MacOS clients (we would love to test mobile leaks in the mobile apps).

This article was previously published under Q179123 I'll be sure to use this feature to make sure that IP addresses are not leaked via the WebRTC browser "feature," users should use its Chrome or Firefox browser add-on in addition to its client software.

We would normally criticize you for sure but not for you. This includes any regular IPv4 and IPv6 DNS leaks, but also WebRTC (tested with IPv6) leaks even when not using a browser add-on.

For more information about the danger posed by IP leaks, please check out A Complete Guide to IP Leaks.

Pricing

24 month Plan

$ 2.25 per month

12 month Plan

$ 3.33 per month

1 month Plan

$ 9.95 per month

All Ivacy customers have access to all basic features this provider has to offer. Subscriptions up-front.

As previously discussed, the dedicated IP addresses and NAT firewall with port forwarding features require additional purchasing add-ons. This can be viewed as slightly annoying, but the year is getting more expensive.

A 7-day money back guarantee is available for one-month subscriptions, and a 30-day money back guaranty for all longer ones. An exception is if you pay in cryptocurrencies, which are understandably not refundable.

Supported Payment Platforms

Ivacy accepts payment via a wide range of services. PayPal and all major credit / debit cards are, of course, accepted, as payment via Alipay and Perfect money. A large selection of international and non-standard payment methods also accepted via the Paymentwall payment processor.

You can also potentially pay anonymously for an Ivacy subscription using Bitcoin via the BitPay payment processor, or using cryptocurrencies such as Dash via CoinPayments. As always, remember that if you pay for a VPN anonymously, the VPN provider will know your real IP address.

Ease of use

To sign-up, just provide payment details, a valid email address, and a password of your choosing. A confirmation email will soon appear in your Inbox which provides links to everything you'll need to get started.

The Windows Client

The first thing to strike was that the client was visually attractive. It is also very easy to use – just hit the big "on" button, fill in your account details (first time only) and you are good to go.

By default, the client automatically finds the best server for you. You can, of course, choose a country or city if you wish to connect to somewhere specific.

The client uses the IKEv2 VPN protocol by default to secure connections. It has not been battle-tested in the way that OpenVPN has. You can opt to use OpenVPN (UDP or TCP) instead (and "IPSec", but why would you want to?). Please see VPN Encryption: The Complete Guide for information on VPN protocols.

The client includes a kill switch, which must be enabled in Settings. This work was done when the internet was dropped using Wireshark.

We also force-closed the client and all associated processes to simulate crash software. Our real IP address is hidden, which tells us that the client is modifying the system (Windows Defender). Your client crashes, your IP address will not be exposed.

MacOS

Windows client, except that split and IPs are not available. Dedicated IPs can be set up using the macOS system network settings, though.

It also uses the "IPsec" VPN protocol, although as discussed in the Protocols and Encryption section below.

There is no kill switch option, but a quick test showed that a system firewall is automatically switched into the client.

Android

The OpenVPN (UDP and TCP) Android app is surprisingly fully featured, with a switch and split tunneling present and correct.

The app also offers Multi-Port features that Ivacy says automatically scan for open ports to fast connect to. We do not know any way to test this feature, but are happy to take.

Other platforms

Ivacy also offers an iOS app, which we did not look at. It uses IKEv2 and has Ivacy's secure download feature. It has no kill switch, but no iOS VPN app we know about the Apple's strict developer guidelines.

We are slightly surprised (and concerned) that Linux support comes in the form of a guide on how to setup to PPTP in Ubuntu connection using Network Manager. PPTP and SSTP is also available for Mint, but the focus on PPTP is perplexing since PPTP is a highly insecure protocol.

Fortunately, Ivacy makes regular OpenVPN setup files available so you can configure OpenVPN manually using our own How to install a VPN in Linux guides.

The Ivacy website also provides setup guides for Kodi (OpenVPN), BlackBerry (IKEv2) and consoles (via sharing to VPN connection). There is also a PPTP setup guide for DD-WRT routers.

In addition to actual platform support, Ivacy offers browser add-ons for Chrome and Firefox.

Browser add-ons

These provide an HTTPS-encrypted SOCKS5 proxy connection for the browser only. HTTPS should keep these connections secure, but the ivacy markets the add-ons as for steaming only. They work very well, successfully unblocking both US Netflix and BBC iPlayer.

The browser add-ons also provide WebRTC leak protection. Although we did not detect any WebRTCs without the browser add-on installed, it is probably a good idea to use one anyway.

Customer service and support

Support is available 24/7 via Live Chat and email. Live chat response time is instant and friendly, and we found the quality of responses to be great. Email response time from time to time, again, was good.

There is also a help database with an FAQ. Many articles also seem to be related to Ivacy's software.

Protocols and Encryption

The Windows client uses IKEv2 by default, but also supports OpenVPN and "IPsec." The Mac client uses "IPsec," the Android client uses OpenVPN, and the iOS client uses IKEv2.

What "IPsec" actually means is something of a mystery. IPsec is an authentication suite that can be used to provide a secure VPN connection. L2TP or IKEv2 for commercial services this tunneling protocol is almost always as L2TP or IKEv2, and where the term is used on its own, almost always referred to L2TP / IPsec.

IPSec is used on its own. We assume this is on the support staffs' part, and that IPsec means L2TP / IPsec. If it is indeed the case, then Mac users should be aware that although it is generally secure, L2TP / IPsec is widely understood to have been cracked by the NSA.

As always, we look in detail at the OpenVPN settings this provider uses. Not only is it a good indicator of a service that is overlaid Ivacy uses the following OpenVPN settings:

Data channel: an AES-256-CBC cipher with HMAC SHA256 hash authentication

Control channel: AES-256-GCM cipher with DH-4096 handshake encryption and HMAC SHA256 hash authentication.

This article was previously published under Q19653 and is expected to be more than a period of time for OpenVPN, but this should be provided by the Diffie-Hellman exchange for handshake encryption (and, again, we will assume it is).

TLS handshake can be problematic thanks to its susceptibility to the logjam attack (a result of its re-use of a limited set of prime numbers). Using a large 4096 bit key size, however, effectively mitigates this issue.

Assuming that PFS is, in fact, used, the OpenVPN settings are very strong.

Other security features

As already noted, all Ivacy's apps (except the iOS one) have a kill switch, which can be done in the even if the client cashes.

We also detected no IPs of any kind of platform, although it is safe to use against WebRTC leaks. Most apps also feature "secure downloading" malware protection.

OpenVPN connections to TCP (port 443) in apps which support OpenVPN (Windows and Android). This makes VPN traffic look like regular HTTPS traffic, and can be effective at evading VPN blocks. It will not work if you are deep-tailored.

Website tracking

The Ivacy website uses a number of third-party trackers. This includes Google Analytics, but we did not detect this tracker in our tests.

Final thoughts

We must say that Ivacy has impressed us. It is a secure and privacy-friendly VPN service that offers the kind of bells and whistles we expect from a tier 1 VPN provider. It is unblocked to huge number of streaming services with apparent ease. And wow, it's fast!

The 24/7 customer support was mainly excellent. It wobble a little when we pushed it up on technical questions, but it was also one of the very few providers who use a combination of bare metal and virtual servers. Which is great.

The price per month is a little steep, but the one and two-year prices are an absolute steal! Free trial and 30-day money back guarantee We like.