Comment: Google One VPN may have suffered from a lack of trust

Last week, Google announced that it would soon shut down the VPN service included with Google One. The company pointed to it only being used by a fraction of subscribers, and I wonder if part of that is due to a lack of consumer trust.

If you’re looking for a bit more privacy while browsing the internet, a VPN is one of the most straightforward solutions. It offers a quick way to prevent your internet provider from seeing your browsing habits, and using a VPN also masks your IP address, making it a bit harder for companies to track you across visits (assuming you properly clear your cookies and such). I’ll also typically use a VPN when connecting to a free public Wi-Fi network.

Around the time that the Google One VPN became widely available, I mentioned it to my only friend who cares enough to use a VPN on a regular basis. His first question to me was “Why should I trust it?”

It’s a simple enough question. And to the company’s credit, there’s an in-depth explanation – backed by a third-party audit – available as to why the Google One VPN can be trusted with your potentially sensitive browsing. However, this is not something that could be quickly and easily conveyed in a casual conversation with someone who isn’t already familiar with networking principles.

Admittedly, this is merely an anecdote, but I wonder if there’s a nugget of truth behind it. Were people simply not using the Google One VPN because they weren’t sure they could trust it? After all, the service was bundled with an already-useful $1.99/month subscription, while monthly NordVPN plans start at $12.99 – six times more!

As the adage goes: if something seems too good to be true, it probably is. A VPN that costs one-sixth of its leading competitor surely must have significant, tangible (privacy/functionality) downsides, right? Google has long tracked individuals’ browsing habits, sometimes even when you don’t expect them to. Even if it’s not true in this case, the perception alone would likely have been damaging.

That said, the service’s lack of use could be simply explained by a lack of mainstream appeal. The average person likely isn’t concerned with (or aware of) the security and privacy issues that a VPN is designed to fix.

Back on the subject of perception, Google is also currently facing its own reputation for “killing” beloved products (pouring out another one for Stadia). I have no doubt that this reputation kept some people from bothering with Google’s VPN, even if they were already paying for Google One. Worse, by shutting it down, Google is affirming those beliefs – “I’m glad I didn’t switch to Google’s VPN; they’re already shutting it down.”

Let’s think about it another way. If hardly anyone was using the Google One VPN, what reason was there to shut it down? Everyone was continuing to pay the subscription and Google only needed to provide a VPN to the handful of customers who actually used it. It’s not as though Google is shutting down VPN services altogether, as Fi Wireless customers and Pixel owners will continue to have access.

Instead, the company has chosen to worsen its “killer” image by eliminating a feature of Google One. But I digress.

At the end of the day, I truly wonder how much of the Google One VPN’s failure can be attributed to a lack of trust. If you can’t immediately and completely trust your VPN to not track your browsing and to still exist for the foreseeable future, what’s the point of it?