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If you wish to be completely anonymous when using a VPN, you must always use buy a VPN via anonymous payment methods. When purchasing a VPN via PayPal, credit card, or bank transfer, you are effectively blowing your online cover. Tracking you down is an easy task if you’ve purchased a VPN subscription using conventional and insecure ways. The payment information that you have provided through your credit card details or PayPal email address will easily link to your identity if needed.
How should you pay for a VPN to remain anonymous? Is it even possible for everyone to use anonymous VPN payment? Let’s have a look at our options. But first, let’s figure your who should pay for a VPN anonymously and why.
Who should pay for a VPN anonymously?
In most cases, you’re going to be just fine if you purchase a VPN via PayPal or a credit card. If you are using VPN to unblock geo-restrictions, or, maybe to avoid ISP throttling of P2P sharing, you don’t have to worry about hiding your identity when paying for a VPN. When using a VPN legally (if it is not prohibited in your country), your payment information does not require extra security, as nobody will want to locate you via your credit card.
However, there are certain cases when you will want and must do your best to hide your identity when paying for a VPN.
Here are some examples of who should always pay for a VPN anonymously:
- journalists in dangerous countries with aggressive censorships
- whistleblowers working to expose criminal activities of governments or illegal organizations
- activists in totalitarian countries
- torrent users in countries that forbid the usage of torrents
- citizens of countries where using a VPN is considered illegal (e.g. China, Russia, etc.)
- other cases when it is important for you to hide the fact that you are using a VPN
Should I buy a VPN anonymously?
If you want to protect your online identity from start to finish, you must not allow any weak spots in your anonymity. This is especially important if you consider yourself in one of the scenarios listed in the previous section, as this could be a matter of life and death for you.
In case you’re not in any special situation and do not see yourself in trouble just because someone will find out that you are using a VPN, then, you don’t have to complicate things with anonymous VPN payment.
Is it safe to pay for a VPN with PayPal?
When paying for a VPN with PayPal you’re putting your online identity at risk. It is a straightforward task to identify your real name and address when you are paying with PayPal. Anyone, from hackers to government agencies will be able to uncover you with a small effort.
What are the best methods to pay for a VPN anonymously?
Some VPN providers allow anonymous payment methods. Though, there are not many options for buying a VPN anonymously. Below, I have listed some that are popular and those that are rare (look for a s̶t̶r̶i̶k̶e̶t̶h̶r̶o̶u̶g̶h̶ text for those that are not accepted by most VPNs).
G̶i̶f̶t̶ ̶C̶a̶r̶d̶s̶
Paying for a VPN with a gift card used to be popular in past. There was a decent number of providers that would issue their own gift cards or accept ones for Amazon, Walmart, Apple Store, etc. Currently, there are almost no VPNs that accept gift card payments. Just a few small VPN providers like TorGuard or Mullvad.
Besides having a small selection of VPNs that accept this method, you will also have to agree to lose 20%-25% of the gift card’s value when using it to pay for a VPN. This is due to VPN providers will need to do extra work to convert a gift card to cash.
P̶a̶y̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶w̶i̶t̶h̶ ̶c̶a̶s̶h̶
Just a small number of VPN providers accept payments with cash. Basically, you just create an account on a provider’s website first, then you write down the account number that gets generated. The last step is to put your account number along with the required amount of notes into an envelope and send it to a VPN company’s headquarters. Not many VPNs accept cash payments. Among those are ProtonVPN and Mullvad. Usually, these providers accept the most popular currencies like USD, CAD, AUD, NZD, EUR, GBP, JPY, RMB, etc.
The downside of buying a VPN with cash is that you will need to wait until the cash arrives at a VPN provider’s office and your account becomes active. You will also need to make sure to keep sending cash every year and well in advance to keep your VPN subscription active.
Paying with crypto
The most popular, the least hassle-free, and the most recommended way to pay for a VPN anonymously. Cryptocurrency is getting wide acceptance by more and more merchants every year. VPN providers are currently trying hard to include Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other popular cryptocurrencies in their payment methods.
You can easily find a good and reliable VPN provider that also accepts anonymous payments with cryptocurrency. Among those are famous providers like NordVPN, ExpressVPN, IvacyVPN, CyberGhost, and others.
Most popular coins like Bitcoin, Ripple, Dash, Litecoin, and Ethereum, are accepted by at least one VPN provider accepting cryptos. Well, at least you will be able to pay with Bitcoin, and, it is easy to convert any other cryptocurrency to it.
The downside of this method is usually it is non-refundable. So, you need to do your homework and choose only the best VPN provider that you will be completely satisfied with. Another disadvantage is, you will have to lose some money for commissions when buying a cryptocurrency.
Does NordVPN accept Bitcoin?
Yes, NordVPN accepts anonymous payments with Bitcoin. Besides Bitcoin, Nord VPN can be purchased using almost any popular cryptocurrency. This is all made possible thanks to NordVPN offering payment via the CoinPayments gateway.
Can you buy ExpressVPN with Bitcoin?
Yes, ExpressVPN accepts Bitcoin payment for anonymous VPN subscriptions. In fact, it is the only anonymous way to pay for ExpressVPN.
How to pay for a VPN anonymously?
Here are the steps to buying a NordVPN anonymously with cryptocurrencies:
- On the NordVPNs web page click the “Get NordVPN” button
- On the next page, enter your email address
- Now, choose a payment method with Crypto Currencies
- Click “Continue to CoinPayments”
You can see how easy it is to pay for NordVPN with Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies completely anonymously. Other VPN providers (like ExpressVPN) require similar steps for anonymous payments.
How do you hide your IP address when buying a VPN anonymously?
It is important to note that when you are purchasing a VPN, even though, you are using an anonymous payment method, your ISP or another third party might still track you and find out that you were buying a VPN. How do you avoid that? You must hide your IP and the traffic that you are sending and receiving.
You can easily hide your IP address when purchasing a VPN anonymously by using these 3 methods:
- Using Tor browser
- Using Opera free VPN
- Using a free VPN from Proton
- Other free VPNs are turned on until you have purchased a VPN using one of the anonymous payment options
Which VPN providers accept anonymous payment?
Now, as we have listed the most popular and highly-available anonymous VPN payment methods, we need to know what providers do actually accept those methods. While many VPNs would claim to be completely anonymous and have a zero-logging policy, most of them would still only offer a standard payment method via PayPal or a credit card, which is just hilarious for them to be considered “anonymous” VPNs.
With that in mind, we have come up with a list of VPNs that actually allow anonymous payment. Here is the list, feel free to choose whatever VPN you like.
NordVPN
It’s a Panama-based VPN that has demonstrated an amazing level of anonymity and offers great speed with every VPN server you choose to connect to. NordVPN is a zero-logging VPN and is secured with the most advanced encryption technologies that are currently available.
Even though NordVPN does not accept gift-card payments, you can still use your favorite cryptocurrency including Bitcoin, Ripple, and Ethereum.
You may not be particularly impressed with this list of anonymous payment methods in the same way as you will be with PureVPN or ProtonVPN, but this VPN is still a very good option if you wish to use cryptocurrency as an anonymous way to pay for a VPN.
Here is the list of anonymous payment options, accepted by NordVPN:
- Cryptocurrencies (Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, and others via CoinPayments)
ExpressVPN
This VPN provider is more expensive than the others listed above, but its main selling point is its location. ExpressVPN is located in the British Virgin Islands and is a highly-secured, zero-logging VPN provider.
Besides anonymous payment methods, this provider has proven to be fast and reliable through many years of operation. If you’re looking for a reliable VPN that is also very anonymous, ExpressVPN would be a very good choice for you.
ExpressVPN has a massive network, is fast and secure, unblocks Netflix and almost everything else supports torrents, has no significant tracking (which has been audited), and provides clients for almost every platform. It is easy to use. In conclusion, this is a fantastic VPN that works flawlessly in practically any situation.
Unfortunately, ExpressVPN only offers 1 option for anonymous payments. No gift cards are currently accepted, but you can always pay with Bitcoin wherever you are located.
Anonymous payment methods available for ExpressVPN are the following:
- Bitcoin
IvacyVPN
This is a Singapore-based VPN provider that is very-very affordable and also accepts anonymous payment methods.
We’ve been testing this provider for more than one year, and it has demonstrated pretty decent speeds, and it also unblocks most of the streaming services.
Ivacy offers fewer anonymous payment methods compared to PureVPN, but you can still choose between bitcoin and SMS payment. Bitcoin will probably work for much more users, as SMS payment is not anonymous in most countries, as we stated in the previous section of this article.
It is a recommended provider with a zero-logging policy, and is very anonymous, as it currently accepts the following private payment methods:
- Bitpay (pay with Bitcoin) or Coingate (allows paying anonymously with different cryptocurrencies)
- Perfect Money (can be topped up with SMS)
ProtonVPN
Swiss-based VPN provider that offers a zero-logging policy, high encryption mechanisms, and is based outside of surveillance alliance jurisdiction. This provider is very special because it allows paying with cash.
ProtonVPN has grown to over 1,400 servers in 61 countries since its establishment. When it comes to VPNs, the more servers, the better because your data transmission speed is impacted by your proximity to a server.
ProtonVPN employs 4096-bit RSA for key exchange and HMAC with SHA384 for message authentication, and all network traffic is secured with AES-256. Full forward secrecy is applied to all of your encrypted VPN traffic, which means that even if encryption keys are obtained, they will only be helpful for one session, not all future ones.
At the moment ProtonVPN accepts the following anonymous payment options:
- Bitcoin
- Cash (you will need to create an account for free, and contact ProtonVPN via e-mail for the details on how to pay anonymously with cash)
CyberGhost VPN
This VPN provider is based in Romania, and is not just offering anonymous payment methods, but is also a zero-logging VPN with modern encryption features, and fast speeds.
CyberGhost VPN’s NoSpy servers are specially tuned servers located in a high-security server facility in CyberGhost’s home nation of Romania. These servers provide increased physical security in the same way that ProtonVPN’s Secure Core servers do. CyberGhost, on the other hand, does not employ its Secure Core servers to support multi-hop connections, but ProtonVPN does.
CyberGhost claims to offer malware and ad filtering in addition to VPN protection. I did not test those myself, and, I recommend using good anti-malware software in any case.
When it comes to anonymous payment, CyberGhost only offers one method, which is payment via Bitcoin.
TorGuard VPN
TorGuard VPN boasts a lot of features, solid encryption settings, and fast torrenting speeds, so it’s a wonderful option for anyone looking for a good VPN for security and anonymity.
On the other hand, TorGuard offers problematic software that is susceptible to freezes and network issues. Furthermore, it’s really unlikely that any of the Netflix movies you want to view will be unblocked. Even if TorGuard’s customer service is excellent, it won’t be able to assist you if the app is behaving badly.
On the bright side, TorGuard offers quite some options for anonymous payment:
- Bitcoin, Litecoin, and other cryptocurrencies with CoinPayments
- Gift cards
- TorGuard gift cards
- Openbucks via Paymentwall
Mullvad VPN
Mullvad VPN rejects the notion that we should expect half-measures from low-cost security solutions. It’s totally open, revealing details that we rarely see from companies and taking a proactive stance on individual privacy and security. A VPN must protect your IP and DNS information from prying eyes in order to be useful. Mullvad does not leak DNS requests and does modify the public IP address, according to multiple tests.
Mullvad has servers in 38 various countries. That’s a nice offering, but it falls way short of the 49-country average we’ve seen among competitors. TMullvad’s server offerings are also limited, with only one location in South America and no presence in Africa. This continent is often neglected by VPN providers.
Having said that, Mullvad VPN boasts a few anonymous payment methods:
- Bitcoin and Bitcoin cash
- Cash
- Vouchers (similar to gift cards)
