A US senator has urged the National Security Agency to publish public guidance on how ordinary people should use virtual private networks (VPNs) to protect their communications from foreign surveillance. The request, from Senator Ron Wyden, notes a wide range of VPN options—open source, commercial, single-hop, multi-hop, mixnet—and argues that existing advice is too general to help individuals make informed choices about threat models and protection levels.
The letter, dated 2 September 2026 and addressed to the NSA director General Joshua Rudd, asks the agency to assess the effectiveness of standard single-hop VPNs, the potential benefits and risks of multi-hop architectures, and the usefulness of techniques such as random delays and padding to defeat timing or traffic analysis.
It also seeks NSA guidance on specific services, including Apple Private Relay, Nym, and Tor, and whether these should be recommended over traditional VPNs for Americans facing heightened surveillance threats. The senator’s questions aim to establish clearer criteria for evaluating these tools, beyond marketing claims.
The NSA is asked to provide answers by 14 October 2026. Ars Technica notes that there is no universally accepted standard for VPN assessment, and experts cited in the article emphasise the complexity of choosing a protection strategy that suits an individual’s threat model, device platform, and trust assumptions. The piece presents the options and concerns; it does not state an official NSA stance.