Durev VPN Accused of Plagiarizing Independent Researchers' Articles for Commercial YouTube Promotion
Independent Russian cybersecurity researcher zarazaexe has publicly accused the commercial VPN service Durev VPN of systematically copying technical articles about Russian internet censorship systems, messenger analysis, and government-issued certificates. The team behind Durev VPN allegedly rewrote the original research into YouTube video scripts, replaced first-person statements with references to their own specialists, and removed all attribution to the source author or project. One video titled СРОЧНО УДАЛИ СЕРТИФИКАТ МИНЦИФРЫ reportedly gained 795,000 views in two days, while the service's Telegram bot shows 260,000 users and charges a minimum subscription of 313 rubles per month. Specific copied elements include scanning results of 46 million Russian IP addresses that yielded 63,000 entries in TSPU whitelists, architectural descriptions of default-deny and fail-closed policies, ECH handling by DPI systems, and detailed reverse-engineering findings from the MAX messenger client. The researcher documented the reuse of his earlier errors about UDP blocking inside whitelists and identical analogies comparing root certificates to apartment keys. When confronted, the Durev VPN representative initially demanded patents, invoked fair use, and later claimed the matter would be reviewed by their lawyer within a week. The researcher published the full chat logs and removed the disputed segment from one video after the complaint.
HabrSep 4, 2026Translated from Russian