Private Internet Access (PIA) review

The short answer

Private Internet Access, usually called PIA, is a US-based paid VPN owned by Kape Technologies. Its strongest evidence comes from the courts. In two US criminal cases, investigators asked for user data and PIA had no activity logs to give. Its app code is public, and Deloitte has reviewed its servers three times. The weak spots are a missing third-party app audit and an owner with a mixed history.

Nobody at Tunnelcheck has tested PIA. This review rests on PIA's own pages and code, Deloitte's conclusions as reported, and court reporting. See how we review.

Who owns PIA and where is it based?

PIA was founded in 2010 by Andrew Lee under a company called London Trust Media. On November 18, 2019 it announced a merger into Kape Technologies, the group that also owns CyberGhost and ExpressVPN. Kape started out as Crossrider, whose browser-extension platform was widely abused by adware makers before it changed strategy in 2016. Wikipedia notes that some PIA users objected to the Kape deal for that reason. Kape has been privately held by Teddy Sagi's company Unikmind since 2023.

PIA's terms of service are with PIA Private Internet Access, Inc. and are governed by the law of Colorado, with Denver County courts for anyone who opts out of arbitration. That makes PIA a US company, subject to US subpoenas, warrants and other legal orders. A no-logs design matters more here, because the legal demands are real and frequent. More in who owns your VPN and are VPNs legal.

Does PIA keep logs? Court cases and audits

PIA says it keeps no logs of your VPN activity. A no-logs policy is easy to write. PIA's is unusual because it has faced two real tests.

• 2016, FBI bomb-threat case. TorrentFreak reported that when the FBI subpoenaed London Trust Media over Preston McWaters, who was charged with making false bomb threats, the company could say only that the IP addresses belonged to a server cluster on the US East Coast.
• 2018, federal hacking case in San Jose. In a case over the hacking of a California news publisher's accounts, London Trust Media's general counsel testified that PIA does not keep logs of customers' internet activity. TorrentFreak reported that the conviction relied on other evidence.

The 2025 engagement followed ISAE 3000 (Revised). CyberInsider reported that Deloitte said nothing came to its attention suggesting PIA's setup was inconsistent with its no-logs description. It also covered PIA's server design, which it describes as running in short-lived containers on RAM disks with full-disk encryption. Wikipedia summarizes the 2022 finding the same way: server configurations matched the privacy policy and weren't designed to identify users. Compare on our VPN audits page.

PIA publishes quarterly transparency reports. For the fourth quarter of 2025 it listed 30 legal requests, including 7 subpoenas and 1 warrant, and said it produced no logs or user data. These are PIA's own figures.

Security features and protocols

PIA's features page offers WireGuard and OpenVPN, both open standards. Its iOS app also lists IKEv2. A protocol is the rule set the app uses to build the encrypted tunnel; see WireGuard vs OpenVPN.

• Open-source apps. PIA's client code is on GitHub under the pia-foss account. Wikipedia lists the desktop and Android apps under the GPLv3 license and the iOS app under MIT. Anyone can read it, which is a different kind of check from an audit.
• Advanced Kill Switch. PIA says it blocks traffic whenever the VPN isn't connected, even if you disconnect on purpose. See our kill switch guide.
• Split tunneling. Lets chosen apps bypass the VPN; see split tunneling.

PIA's track record

We found no reported breach of PIA's VPN servers. The two court cases above are the main public record, and both went in PIA's favor on logging. The other headline came in 2018, when London Trust Media hired Mark Karpelès, the former head of the collapsed Mt. Gox bitcoin exchange, as its chief technology officer. Wikipedia notes the appointment drew attention because of his legal history in Japan. It didn't involve any known problem with PIA user data.

Streaming and torrenting with PIA

Torrenting. PIA's features page says it supports P2P connections on every server. It also offers port forwarding, which helps torrent clients accept incoming connections, on selected servers. Its terms forbid distributing copyrighted content you don't own or have a license for, and using the service to break the law. A VPN hides your downloads from your internet provider. It doesn't make copyright infringement legal. See is torrenting illegal and our safe torrenting guide.

Streaming. Streaming services usually forbid viewing another country's catalog and block VPN IP addresses, so what works changes. No VPN can promise access. See why streaming services block VPNs.

Apps and devices

PIA's help center says one subscription allows an unlimited number of simultaneous connections. It has apps for Windows, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS, plus browser extensions. A router setup covers devices without apps.

Price and refund (checked 2026-11-13)

The three-year price was labeled as a limited early-access offer with no end date shown, so it may change soon. PIA's terms give a 30-day refund on the first purchase. App-store, gift-card and third-party purchases are refunded by whoever processed them, and buying a new account within three months of a refund makes the new one ineligible. See the official pricing page and our checked VPN prices.

What we couldn’t verify

• The court files themselves. Our account of the 2016 and 2018 cases comes from TorrentFreak’s reporting on the filings. We didn’t read the dockets.
• The 2024 Deloitte scope. PIA’s posts describe the 2024 engagement only briefly; the detailed scope we list is for 2025.
• Port forwarding coverage. PIA’s pages variously say "most" locations and "selected servers". Check the server list in the app.
• How long the promotional price lasts. The page showed no end date for the early-access offer.

A court case shows what a company had on hand on one occasion; an audit shows how its systems were built during a set window. PIA is one of the few providers with both kinds of evidence, which is why it sits near the top of this batch despite the US base.

Who PIA suits, and who should look elsewhere

• Suits: people who value a no-logs claim that has survived real legal demands, and open code they can inspect.
• Suits: torrent users who want P2P everywhere and port forwarding.
• Look elsewhere if you don't want a US-based provider. Proton VPN (Switzerland) and Mullvad (Sweden) are alternatives.
• Look elsewhere if Kape's ownership is a concern; ExpressVPN and CyberGhost share it.

See also CyberGhost vs Private Internet Access.