vpnsecure.me canceling lifetime plans

gbzret4d · May 2025

Their newest email (they are just too stupid to buy a business):

This isn’t your average “marketing email.”

This is us owning the chaos, addressing the backlash, and speaking directly to the heart of what’s happened — and what we’re doing about it.

⚠️ What Just Happened If you’re reading this and still wondering, “Why did my VPN stop working?” — here’s the short version:
In 2023, we acquired VPN Secure through an asset-only deal.

We got the tech, the brand, and the infrastructure/technology — but none of the company, contracts, payments, or obligations from the previous owners.

The Lifetime Deals (LTDs) sold by the old team between 2015 and 2017 were not disclosed to us. We only found out months later.

We kept those accounts running for 2 extra years, entirely at our own cost — even though we never received a single cent from those subscriptions.

On April 28, 2025, all LTD accounts were officially deactivated.
The original email explaining this?

Some of you never saw it — it landed in spam, or you simply missed it.
And to those users: we're truly sorry you were caught off guard.
📎 Yes — We Have Proof Some people say, “you should’ve known.” So here it is:
👉 Original Flippa Listing (April 2023)

We’ve also uploaded a PDF copy of the sale listing here
We did our due diligence — including reviewing the past 6–12 months of financials.
But nowhere in the listing, profit and loss statements, or communication was there any mention of Lifetime Deals.

What was presented — and what we bought — was a monthly subscription business and the technology behind it.
⚖️ Why We Didn’t Sue the Seller Yes, we looked into legal action.
We consulted lawyers in both jurisdictions, but the harsh truth is: a corporate lawsuit would’ve cost more than the entire purchase price of the business.
And by the time we uncovered the LTD issue, the seller had likely already spent the funds or dissolved operations.
So, instead of sinking into a legal black hole, we focused on keeping the service running...
Improving the infrastructure, and doing the best we could with the hand we were dealt — including supporting LTD users for 2 more years at our expense.

💥 The Aftermath — And the Reviews

👉🏼 https://www.trustpilot.com/review/vpnsecure.me We expected some heat. But the wave of reviews, messages, and yes, even threats, has been overwhelming.
Some called us scammers, others claimed we “gaslit” users, and a few even accused us of corporate fraud.
We’ve read every single word.

❝ But what about all the users who paid for ‘lifetime’? ❞
We get it. You feel betrayed.

And even if we didn’t sell you that deal, it’s our logo, our app, our name — and so it feels like we’re the ones breaking the promise.
We own that perception, even if we didn’t create the original deal.
❤️ To Those Who Stayed — Thank You Here’s the part that surprised us:
A huge number of you understood.
You read the message. You recognized the challenge.
And you signed up again — even after everything.
We don’t take that lightly.
To every one of you who upgraded to the new plan — thank you. 🫶🏼
You’re helping keep the service alive, fast, private, and improving.

And you’re the reason VPN Secure still exists today.
🧠 What You Can Do Now We’re not here to silence criticism — we welcome it.
But we also know some users want to share their side of the story — positive or negative.
If you want to support us (or call us out again), you can do it here:
👉 https://www.trustpilot.com/review/vpnsecure.me
Good or bad — it’s your voice. Use it.
👇 In Case You Missed It We’re still offering this one-time discounted plan for former LTD users until May 31, 2025:
(Once you get one you'll be able to keep renewing it for as long as you want)

✅ $55 per years

✅ $19 per year

✅ $1.87/month

🔗 Redeem Offer Now:
https://www.vpnsecure.me/checkout/lifetime/upgrade/
⚙️ What’s New at VPN Secure In the last 24 months, we’ve been hard at work — here’s what’s new:

🔐 Wireguard Support (faster + more efficient than OpenVPN)
🛡️ Special Wireguard Edition designed to bypass advanced Deep Packet Inspection
📱 Updated iOS App with improved speed, reliability, and user interface

These upgrades were made specifically to improve connection stability, streaming performance, and censorship resistance — even in high-surveillance regions.

Our commitment to security and user privacy hasn’t changed — it’s gotten stronger.
And company and team is in the Bahamas ( not one of five eyes countries anymore 😉 )
We genuinely want to avoid adding any frustration to your inbox or VPN experience.
If you’ve enjoyed using VPN Secure, we’d love to have you with us for the next chapter.
One Last Thing…
Let’s be real: we had a choice.
We could either shut down the business entirely — walk away from our investment and let everything go dark — or we could take the hit, face the backlash, and try to rebuild the right way.

We chose the hard path.

Because even if the LTDs were hidden from us… even if the reviews hurt… even if many walked away…
We knew some of you still wanted a fast, secure, privacy-focused VPN — with no lifetime illusions, just solid service.

You will never hear about Lifetime Deals from our company — we never offered them, and we never will.

That was a promise made years ago by a previous owner, years before a questionable exit, long before we took over.

But here’s our promise now:
We’re building something worth staying for — and this time, we’re doing it right.

With respect (and lessons learned),
The VPN Secure Team
[email protected]

gbzret4d · May 2025

Their uploaded files:
https://flippa.com/11360829-a-12-year-old-vpn-service-provider-with-custom-windows-mac-ios-and-android-subscription-app-utilizing-openvpn-servers-established-in-over-30-countries
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GnOgjUolaRLT9SyveiF-mxm4pauxZK8M/view?pli=1

Just keep their reviews down:
https://www.trustpilot.com/review/vpnsecure.me

the_doctor · May 2025

The funny thing is, is that they made it clear that they (were/are) making a healthy profit even with all the lifetime users.

default · May 2025

@the_doctor said:
The funny thing is, is that they made it clear that they (were/are) making a healthy profit even with all the lifetime users.

Sure they do.

Lifetime plans are seen by consumers as an investment. The customer pays more money for a lifetime, investing in the provider, while the provider uses that money to grow the business with startup cash.

A lifetime plan is usually not abused, because the customer does not wish to lose the investment, and also because of the bigger price pad for service. Lifetime can become a burden later for the provider, but again: the customer does not abuse the service in my opinion, instead he/she protects it over the long run.

As such, I don't think providers can't make profit due to lifetime plans. All providers can make profit with lifetime plans, as long as they invest wisely into business growth. If the money from lifetimes is spent on exotic vacations (like Jamaica or Hawaii), then lifetimes become a huge burden really fast, making it a huge scam.

DediRock · May 2025

How do the numbers even work out for a lifetime plan?

the_doctor · May 2025

@DediRock said:
How do the numbers even work out for a lifetime plan?

The economics of lifetime plans for SaaS companies are quite challenging to balance. Let me break this down:

Key Economic Factors

At their core, lifetime plans work when:

The upfront payment exceeds the customer acquisition cost (CAC)
The net present value (NPV) of future servicing costs remains below the lifetime payment
The company has alternative revenue streams or funding to sustain operations

Why Companies Offer Lifetime Plans

Cash flow acceleration: Immediate capital injection that can fund growth initiatives
Reduced churn metrics: Lifetime customers aren't counted in monthly churn calculations
Customer acquisition tool: Creates urgency and perceived value
Early-stage momentum: Helps startups demonstrate traction to investors

The Maths Problem

Most lifetime plans ultimately don't work mathematically unless:

The product has minimal ongoing servicing costs
The lifetime value is priced at 3-5x annual subscription
The company expects significant upsell opportunities
Customer usage patterns show natural attrition despite "lifetime" access

Historical Outcomes

Companies offering lifetime deals typically follow these paths:

Discontinuation: They honour existing lifetime users but stop offering new deals
Tiered limitations: Lifetime plans receive fewer features than subscription tiers
Company failure: Unfortunately, many companies offering aggressive lifetime deals eventually fail
Strategic pivot: Converting lifetime users to "founding members" with preferential but not unlimited access

The most successful implementations treat lifetime revenue as venture capital – funds to build something bigger rather than as sustainable revenue.

Ympker · May 2025

@lirrr said:
i bought windscribe lifetime for 69$ 7 years ago
no regret at all

Bought Windscribe and Keepsolid VPN in like 2016/17ish. No regrets.

gbzret4d · May 2025

@default said:

@the_doctor said:
The funny thing is, is that they made it clear that they (were/are) making a healthy profit even with all the lifetime users.

Sure they do.

Lifetime plans are seen by consumers as an investment. The customer pays more money for a lifetime, investing in the provider, while the provider uses that money to grow the business with startup cash.

A lifetime plan is usually not abused, because the customer does not wish to lose the investment, and also because of the bigger price pad for service. Lifetime can become a burden later for the provider, but again: the customer does not abuse the service in my opinion, instead he/she protects it over the long run.

As such, I don't think providers can't make profit due to lifetime plans. All providers can make profit with lifetime plans, as long as they invest wisely into business growth. If the money from lifetimes is spent on exotic vacations (like Jamaica or Hawaii), then lifetimes become a huge burden really fast, making it a huge scam.

Lifetime deals helps them to grow until they have enough clients to sell their business.

farsighter · May 2025

Anyone who acquires a company also assumes its liabilities, even if they did not thoroughly examine the company's condition or claim that certain facts were not disclosed. Any other portrayal is a distortion of the legal reality.

edoarudo5 · May 2025

@cupcake said:
Only 'lifetime' vpn deals from stacksocial that still work and still being honored is keepsolid vpnunlimited and windscribe. All others goes to shit, wasting money.

I still have my Hotspot Shield lifetime premium from stacksocial. It doesn't have the greatest/good reputation for privacy but speedwise it works wonders for me, the fastest of all the mainstream VPN providers I have tried so far.

gbzret4d · May 2025

@farsighter said:
Anyone who acquires a company also assumes its liabilities, even if they did not thoroughly examine the company's condition or claim that certain facts were not disclosed. Any other portrayal is a distortion of the legal reality.

That is correct. I think vpnsecure.me has simply smelled the money and wants to continue to maximize its profits.

techdragon · May 2025

Well...

https://www.trustpilot.com/review/vpnsecure.me

ACARROT · May 2025

@techdragon said:
Well...

https://www.trustpilot.com/review/vpnsecure.me

I'm glad they're getting review bombed, the email was 100% gaslighting customers to think it's normal to continue supporting after pulling the rug out from under their users...

A huge number of you understood.
You read the message. You recognized the challenge.
And you signed up again — even after everything.
We don’t take that lightly.

techdragon · May 2025

@gbzret4d said:
Who actually bought them?

HOLDXB Trading FZCO

Owned by: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rbrabant

techdragon · May 2025

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/05/vpn-firm-says-it-didnt-know-customers-had-lifetime-subscriptions-cancels-them

gbzret4d · May 2025

@techdragon said:
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/05/vpn-firm-says-it-didnt-know-customers-had-lifetime-subscriptions-cancels-them

Now the negative reviews will grow

gbzret4d · May 2025

Did they have customers on monthly payment plans? If so, did they end those contracts or did they keep billing their credit cards on file as usual? I bet I know the answer to that.

If this is actually a real contract (rather than legally marketing puffery) then I would think that those liabilities could only be discharged with the consent of the creditor or under a court supervised chapter 11/7 bankruptcy proceeding. You don't just get to keep the assets and ditch the liabilities just because you feel like it.

kenjing789 · May 2025

How do they dont know about lifetime plan at all , do they have no admin dashboard with a ton of metric or doing yearly report summary sales per year ?
Its just pure "We dont respect the investor or lifetime user, your money now gone, git gud"

gbzret4d · May 2025

@kenjing789 said:
How do they dont know about lifetime plan at all , do they have no admin dashboard with a ton of metric or doing yearly report summary sales per year ?
Its just pure "We dont respect the investor or lifetime user, your money now gone, git gud"

"now we are big enough thanks to our lifetime purchasing customers and now we fake an acquisition and get rid of our old customers with some chatgpt generated newsletter"

gbzret4d · May 2025

More and more news sites are so have articles about vpnsecure.me Here is some bigger German news site https://www.golem.de/news/nutzer-veraergert-vpn-anbieter-kuendigt-unerwartet-alle-lifetime-zugaenge-2505-196144.html

gbzret4d · May 2025

New email from them, the shit show continues:

We’re reaching out again — not to sell, but to set the record straight.

Many of you told us you never received the original message about your Lifetime account.
So, we're sending this follow-up to make sure it gets through.

If you've already seen it — or if you're tired of hearing from us — there's an unsubscribe link at the bottom.

We also want to address, in one place, the most common questions and concerns we've seen in recent reviews — clearly, honestly, and without spin.

💥 What Happened — And Why It Feels Wrong

You bought a Lifetime plan.
Then one day, your VPN stopped working 🚨

And the email explaining why came too late (or not at all for some of you)
We understand how that felt: like a promise was broken behind your back.

To be clear: we did send an email before deactivation. But after 5+ years of silence, our mail servers choked under the load.
Over 20% of the list bounced. That disabled our email delivery for 7 days.

We cleaned the list with EmailListVerify, moved to Mailjet and SendGrid, and resent — but for many of you, it didn’t arrive in time.

A warning that doesn’t land isn’t a warning. And for that, we sincerely apologize 🙇🏼‍♂️

⚙️ Why Lifetime Access Ended

In 2023, we acquired VPN Secure in a strict asset-only sale.

We inherited a fragile product doing $6,000/month in sales, costing $4,000/month to host,
and with 90% of usage coming from LTD accounts we’d never been told existed.

We didn’t run. We didn’t cash-grab.

We kept those accounts active for 2 full years, while rebuilding from OpenVPN to WireGuard, rewriting the app stack, and doing it all with a team of 3 people.

No venture capital. No corporate backing.
Just a small team, self-funded, building the kind of privacy-first VPN we’d want to use ourselves.

But from the beginning, the math wasn't working. The infrastructure couldn’t support it.
We had to make the hardest decision a small business can make — to cut a legacy program that was no longer survivable.

We know it doesn’t feel fair. But it was the only path forward.

Many people have asked: "How could you not know about the Lifetime Deals?"
It’s a fair question — and here’s the honest answer.

The Flippa listing provided by the seller didn’t mention Lifetime plans at all.
Payment records from PayPal and PinPayments showed only recurring subscriptions.

The Lifetime purchases had been processed separately, through third-party platforms like StackSocial, which were never disclosed.

In hindsight, yes — a Google search might have revealed these past deals.

But at the time, we didn’t imagine the previous owner would distribute a high volume of unsustainable “lifetime” offers and never document them. It was like buying a cleaning business, only to later discover the former owner had sold thousands of deep-discount Groupon packages that would cost more to fulfill than they earned — and forgot to mention it.

Ending access wasn’t a decision we made lightly.

But it was the only way to ensure VPN Secure could keep operating — and improving — for paying users moving forward.

🚨 But… Can You Really Do That?

We understand this isn’t the answer you were hoping for.
But here’s the reality — as uncomfortable as it is:

The original seller of your Lifetime subscription was BoostNetwork Pty Ltd, an Australian company.
When they sold off all VPN Secure assets and ceased operations, their "lifetime" effectively ended with them.

That’s not just our interpretation — it's how Lifetime Deals are often handled when businesses change hands.

One well-known example?

When MyHeritage acquired Geni.com in 2012, they canceled all Lifetime memberships and converted them to 5-year plans.
And that was a company with 400+ employees and over 50 million users.

We’re a 3-person, self-funded team, and we still kept Lifetime accounts active for two full years, even though we never received a cent from those deals.

We know two extra years isn’t a “lifetime.”
But it was our good-faith attempt to give something — rather than cutting it off the day we acquired the brand.

We truly wish there had been a cleaner, fairer way forward.
But sometimes, in business transitions, imperfect solutions are the only way to keep the service alive at all.

🔐 Why You Can Still Trust VPN Secure

We’ve seen the reviews:
“If they cut my LTD access, how can I trust them with my data?”

VPN Secure is no longer in Australia — a Five Eyes surveillance country where data requests can be silently enforced.
We’re now based in the Bahamas — outside all intelligence-sharing alliances, with no mandatory logging laws.

We aren’t dodging oversight — we’re resisting it.

And we never once — not once — logged, sold, or shared user data. Ever.

We rebuilt our entire app and server stack using privacy-first protocols like WireGuard, with no third-party analytics or tracking.
And added protection against Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) systems.

We’re not evading oversight. We’re resisting it — legally and technically.

🤝 A Private Offer — Just for LTD Users

Want to give it another shot? Choose the plan that works for you:

✅ 3 Years of VPN Secure — for $55

✅ or $19 for 1 year

✅ or $1.87/month

🔗 Reactivate My Account 🔗
👉 https://www.vpnsecure.me/checkout/lifetime/upgrade/ 👈🏼

Full access to ALL the premium servers

Built-in support for WireGuard + Stealth Mode

No upsells. No renewal traps. No nonsense.

This isn’t a promotion. It’s a quiet path back, for those who want it.

This offer is only visible to former LTD users via email. It won’t be listed publicly.

🎤 One Last Thought

We’ve responded to hundreds of angry reviews — not with copy-paste, but as human beings trying to do the right thing in a very difficult situation.

You may still walk away. That’s your right.
But if you choose to stay, we’ll keep showing up — with honesty, simplicity, and privacy-first principles at the core.

No marketing. No magic.
Just VPN done right — and owned when it goes wrong.

Thanks for reading 🙏🏼
And thank you, sincerely, for being part of VPN Secure.

And if you stay, thanks for your trust. 🫶🏼

—

The VPN Secure Team

Private by design
Based in the Bahamas
Answerable only to you.

default · May 2025

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