Being quite a new addition to the VPN scene, this Cyprus based VPN provider released their VPN service less than 12 months ago.
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It has taken a few people by surprise with some nifty advanced features, and the professional attitude of the company.
There are a free plan and a premium package which delivers quite a few more features, but at least users can get a taste before committing to purchasing the service outright.
Here we will take a look at what Whoer offers and how it compares to VPN services which have been around for a while.
Pros
Cons
Plans and Pricing
With the free plan, you have access to one server which is located in the Netherlands.
When you look at the premium package, you have the following pricing plans.
- 1 month: $9.90 per month
- 6 months: $6.50 per month. Billed as $39 every six months
- 12 months: $4.08 per month. Billed as $49 every 12 months
There is the option to add any promo code if you find one, and then you can select your payment options which include:
Bitcoin, Litecoin, Zcash, Qiwi, Yandex.Money, Perfect Money, and Web Money.
Key Features
Privacy
While the company is based in Cyprus, the service operates under the legislation of the Republic of Nauru which is a small island in Micronesia.
This places it outside of any jurisdiction. Although the service is marketed as a VPN, it is more of a proxy server service, albeit a good one that is capable of hiding activities from your ISP.
The company also states their service is secure enough for use in Wi-Fi zones, making online payments and bank transfers.
Logging
The company has a zero logging policy which is welcomed, and due to their location, they are well placed outside of any 5-eyes or 14-eyes jurisdiction.
Ease of Use
The service is straightforward to use, and you are presented with a clear and easy to read interface that comprises 3 tabs (on the free plan): VPN, Plans, and Settings.
The VPN is the main and consists of a drop-down list of the VPN server location you can connect, select one of these and then hit the large connect button.
The settings are minimal and allow users to use system DNS servers, check updates automatically, use UDP connection, and mask home connection.
Supported Devices
Whoer is available for the following operating systems: Windows, Mac OS, and Linux. It allows 3 connections per license.
Apps
The service doesn’t support mobile devices at present, although the company has stated these will be coming in the near future.
Sign-Up
All that is required to sign-up for the service is an email address. This can keep you anonymous especially when you use the cryptocurrency payment methods. You are also asked to accept the company terms and conditions.
Set-Up
The service is effortless to use, and once you have downloaded the client software, you only need to enter the certificate key to log in. You can set the app to remember this and to auto-connect at your system start-up.
Advanced Features
Because Whoer VPN isn’t a full VPN in the real sense, there are minimal features. There is no kill switch included.
However, going to the Whoer.net site does offer plenty of information and tools. As soon as you type Mr. Whoer and load the page, the service shows all of your connection information. This is comprehensive and should be enough to convince anyone to use their VPN service.
Some of the things the company does are to tell you how to hide yourself online, such as how to hide your user agent. This is via their blog and is full of useful information on how to maintain a level of anonymity.
Tools available on the Whoer net site are VPN sales page, Web proxy, Connection speed test, Ping and Whois.
The web proxy site will only deliver the Netherlands server unless users have chosen to use the full service.
Browser Extensions
Whoer has extensions which are available for Opera, Firefox and Chrome-based browsers. These are as simple to use as the client software.
Performance
Although there is no information on protocols used, Whoer does use AES-256-CBC for the cipher and 2048-bit RSA for handshakes on OpenVPN.
Additionally, the service has a small network, but they delivered favorable results in the speed test.
No issues were found in testing, and there were no disconnects. The company does employ the use of cloud VPN server devices in some locations.
Customer Service
For a new service, the Whoer customer support lands above many other long-standing VPN providers.
They were prompt and helpful, and although they don’t offer 24/7 live chat, they do have a live chat as well as a ticketing service.
Whoer tutorials on YouTube video has been rented, and there are plenty available to show you how you can fix things.
Netflix
The company actively promote and guarantee they can connect to US Netflix, they also claim they can connect to BBC iPlayer, Hulu and Amazon Prime among others.
During testing, these services could be connected to, but how long they can maintain this is exciting to see considering Netflix continually bans entire IP address ranges.
Torrenting
Downloading torrents is allowed on a few servers. But, because the service is more geared to being a proxy rather than a full VPN, it is not something we would recommend at the moment.
Wrap Up
The Whoer proxy is a Swiss army knife of features for internet services which might not be apparent, but for a new service, they do quite a lot of things right.
For a service which is so young, it is easy to see the professionals who are behind the service know exactly what they are doing.
At present, the service is more like a work in progress than a finished product. For this reason, their pricing is a little high for a service which does lack features, and outright privacy.
To recommend the services would be wrong and unfair at the same time. The potential is there, and they perform better than some larger companies.
However, it just seems they are not yet doing enough to say go ahead and sign up.
The Whoer VPN offers a lot, but it doesn’t deliver enough to be a complete solution.
