Virtual non-public community (VPN) supplier Surfshark on Tuesday introduced that it’s shutting down its servers in India as a response to the federal government’s directive that made it obligatory for VPN service suppliers to report and preserve logs of customers for 180 days and acquire and preserve buyer information for 5 years. The Netherlands-based firm stated it operated below a strict “no log” coverage, so the brand new necessities by the federal government go in opposition to its “core ethos.” Last week, ExpressVPN pulled its VPN servers within the nation in response to the federal government’s order.

Surfshark stated that its bodily servers in India would be shut down earlier than the brand new regulation comes into energy. The firm determined to introduce its digital Indian servers as a substitute of the bodily servers within the nation that will likely be positioned in Singapore and London. The digital servers could have an Indian IP to offer the identical performance, however with out being bodily positioned within the nation.

The transfer by Surfshark is just like ExpressVPN that final week eliminated its VPN servers in India and began providing digital Indian servers to its customers.

“Virtual servers are functionally identical to physical ones – the main difference is that they’re not located in the stated country. They still provide the same functionality,” Surfshark stated.

The firm additionally underlined that its customers in India who don’t use Indian servers wouldn’t discover any variations.

“A VPN is an online privacy tool, and Surfshark was founded to make it as easy to use for the common users as possible. The infrastructure that Surfshark runs on has been configured in a way that respects the privacy of our users, and we will not compromise our values – or our technical base,” stated Gytis Malinauskas, Head of Legal at Surfshark, in a ready assertion.

Surfshark additionally stated that it will proceed to intently “monitor the government’s attempts to limit Internet freedom and encourage discussions intended to persuade the government to hear the arguments of the tech industry.”

The firm talked about that VPN service suppliers leaving the nation was not good for the IT sector.

Citing its internal data, Surfshark stated that since 2004, 14.9 billion accounts have been leaked on-line — of which, 254.9 million are of customers from India.

“Taking such radical action that highly impacts the privacy of millions of people living in India will most likely be counterproductive and strongly damage the sector’s growth in the country. Ultimately, collecting excessive amounts of data within Indian jurisdiction without robust protection mechanisms could lead to even more breaches nationwide,” the corporate famous.

India’s Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) handed the order requiring VPN service suppliers to maintain a log of their customers for at the very least 5 years and sharing them with authorities when required. It will come into pressure from June 27.

Shortly after the federal government’s order grew to become public, varied VPN service suppliers expressed their dissent. NordVPN father or mother Nord Security was amongst the primary ones to trace to take away its servers from the nation if no different choices are offered.