Privacy & no-KYC
Which countries have no mandatory data retention?
Panama, Seychelles, Belize, Costa Rica, Curaçao, Moldova and Georgia impose no general data-retention obligation on hosting providers. Switzerland's obligations are narrow and telecoms-focused. Romania struck its retention law down twice on constitutional grounds, and the EU's original Data Retention Directive was invalidated by the Court of Justice in 2014.
Retention law usually targets telecommunications operators rather than hosting providers, so the practical question is how broadly a given country defines "operator". In several EU states the definition has been read widely enough to capture hosts.
Because obligations change, we treat this as a live question rather than a settled one. If a jurisdiction we operate in introduces a retention mandate, we will say so on the location page and in the warrant canary rather than quietly complying.
See also: Warrant canary · Data retention
7 answers in Privacy & no-KYC
- What is no-KYC hosting? No-KYC hosting is server hosting that does not require identity verification. No passport, no photo ID, no billing address and no payment card. An ema…
- Is no-KYC hosting legal? Yes. There is no general legal requirement to identify server customers in the jurisdictions where OnionVPS operates. Anti-money-laundering identifica…
- How do I buy a VPS anonymously? Use a provider that requires no identity verification, sign up from a network that is not your home connection, use an email alias created for the pur…
- What data does a hosting provider collect about me? Most providers collect a name, billing address, payment card, phone number, government ID, signup IP address, and complete access and connection logs.…
- Do VPS providers keep logs of what I do? Most do. Netflow records, connection logs and panel access logs are standard, retained for 30 to 365 days, and in the EU and UK certain retention is l…
- Can a VPS be traced back to me? It depends entirely on the links you create, not on the hosting itself. A no-KYC server paid for in Monero and administered over Tor has no provider-s…