Surfshark Shuts Down Indian Servers In Response To New Government Cybersecurity Directive

In response to the Indian government’s new data retention directives, Surfshark has now decided to shut its servers in India. The new directives require VPN providers to record customer logs for a period of five years minimum, which has miffed the VPN players in India.

This is the second large exit after ExpressVPN shut down its India servers last week, in a vehement protest against the Indian government’s new data retention law that is going to go online on June 27.

“Surfshark proudly operates under a strict “no logs” policy, so such new requirements go against the core ethos of the company. 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,” said Surfshark on its blog.

The Indian government had released a new directive on April 28 that VPN providers would have to collect and store information of their users for a minimum of five years. The rule would apply even after a user had deregistered with the VPN provider. 

With Surfshark shutting down its servers in India, other VPN providers are also pondering on removing their servers from the country.

Surfshark said that it would continue to provide its services in the country through virtual Indian servers – which will be physically located in Singapore and London. The company has assured that the virtual servers will provide the same functionality. 

“VPN suppliers leaving India isn’t good for its burgeoning IT sector. Surfshark’s data shows that since 2004, the year data breaches became widespread, 14.9B accounts have been leaked and a striking 254.9M of them belong to users from India,” emphasised Surfshark.

The company further said that such a radical change of stance by the Indian government could impact privacy of millions of people living in India and damage the growth of IT sector in the country.

Also read: More VPN Providers To Follow After ExpressVPN’s India Exit?