Technologies

Surfshark Passes No-Logs Audit

Auditing firm Deloitte confirmed that the configuration of Surfshark’s IT systems were in line with the VPN’s no-logs policy.

Another virtual private network provider just took an important step towards boosting its transparency with customers. Surfshark — CNET’s Editors’ Choice for Best Value VPN and one of our top VPN picks — passed an independent no-logs audit conducted by auditing firm Deloitte, the VPN company said in a blog post on Wednesday.

«The positive result from Deloitte’s no-logs assurance report provides factual evidence to our users and future customers that Surfshark operates on the highest privacy and quality standards,» Surfshark’s VPN product owner Justas Pukys wrote. «We will continue to perform various audits and tests to get independent verification of our security and privacy measures.»

The audit examined the configuration and management of Surfshark’s IT systems and supporting IT operations and was conducted between Nov. 21 and Dec. 2, 2022, according to a summary of Deloitte’s audit report (PDF). As part of the audit, Deloitte inspected the design and configuration of Surfshark’s standard VPN servers, static IP VPN servers, multihop servers and multiport servers.

«Based on the procedures performed and the evidence obtained, in our opinion, the configuration of IT systems and management of the supporting IT operations is properly prepared, in all material respects in accordance with [Surfshark’s no-logs policy],» Deloitte said.

Deloitte’s validation is important, because an independent audit is one of the only ways to confirm that a VPN provider’s no-logs claims are legitimate. Even though an independent audit from a firm like Deloitte can only confirm its findings for the scope and duration of its audit, it can offer customers a certain measure of confidence that the VPN they’re using is genuine in what it promises.

«[The] No-logs Policy is one of the most important features of our Services,» Surfshark says in its Terms of Service. «It means your activities are not in any way logged, retained, or transferred to third parties when you connect to our Services. We do not collect any information about what you do online (your visited IP addresses, browsing history, session information, used bandwidth, connection time stamps, network traffic or any other similar data).»

Surfshark’s announcement comes two weeks after its sister company NordVPN announced its own independent no-logs audit, also completed by Deloitte. Surfshark had its browser extensions independently audited in 2018 and its server infrastructure in 2021, but Deloitte’s audit is Surfshark’s first independent no-logs audit.

For more on VPNs, check out Surfshark’s new Dynamic MultiHop feature and how to boost your VPN speeds.

Technologies

Tesla Has a New Range of Affordable Electric Cars: How Much They Cost

The new, stripped-back versions of the Model Y and Model 3 have a more affordable starting price.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Strands Hints, Answers and Help for Oct. 22 #598

Here are hints and answers for the NYT Strands puzzle for Oct. 22, No. 598.

Looking for the most recent Strands answer? Click here for our daily Strands hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Today’s NYT Strands puzzle is a fun one — I definitely have at least two of these in my house. Some of the answers are a bit tough to unscramble, so if you need hints and answers, read on.

I go into depth about the rules for Strands in this story.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections and Mini Crossword answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: NYT Connections Turns 1: These Are the 5 Toughest Puzzles So Far

Hint for today’s Strands puzzle

Today’s Strands theme is: Catch all.

If that doesn’t help you, here’s a clue: A mess of items.

Clue words to unlock in-game hints

Your goal is to find hidden words that fit the puzzle’s theme. If you’re stuck, find any words you can. Every time you find three words of four letters or more, Strands will reveal one of the theme words. These are the words I used to get those hints but any words of four or more letters that you find will work:

BATE, LICE, SLUM, CAPE, HOLE, CARE, BARE, THEN, SLAM, SAMBA, BACK

Answers for today’s Strands puzzle

These are the answers that tie into the theme. The goal of the puzzle is to find them all, including the spangram, a theme word that reaches from one side of the puzzle to the other. When you have all of them (I originally thought there were always eight but learned that the number can vary), every letter on the board will be used. Here are the nonspangram answers:

TAPE, COIN, PENCIL, BATTERY, SHOELACE, THUMBTACK

Today’s Strands spangram

Today’s Strands spangram is JUNKDRAWER. To find it, look for the J that’s five letters down on the far-left row, and wind down, over and then up.

Quick tips for Strands

#1: To get more clue words, see if you can tweak the words you’ve already found, by adding an «S» or other variants. And if you find a word like WILL, see if other letters are close enough to help you make SILL, or BILL.

#2: Once you get one theme word, look at the puzzle to see if you can spot other related words.

#3: If you’ve been given the letters for a theme word, but can’t figure it out, guess three more clue words, and the puzzle will light up each letter in order, revealing the word.

Technologies

Today’s Wordle Hints, Answer and Help for Oct. 22, #1586

Here are hints and the answer for today’s Wordle for Oct. 22, No. 1,586.

Looking for the most recent Wordle answer? Click here for today’s Wordle hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Wordle puzzle features some letters I don’t often guess, but it’s not terribly difficult. If you need a new starter word, check out our list of which letters show up the most in English words. If you need hints and the answer, read on.

Today’s Wordle hints

Before we show you today’s Wordle answer, we’ll give you some hints. If you don’t want a spoiler, look away now.

Wordle hint No. 1: Repeats

Today’s Wordle answer has one repeated letter.

Wordle hint No. 2: Vowels

Today’s Wordle answer has one vowel.

Wordle hint No. 3: First letter

Today’s Wordle answer begins with S.

Wordle hint No. 4: Last letter

Today’s Wordle answer ends with T.

Wordle hint No. 5: Meaning

Today’s Wordle answer can refer to an action displaying spectacular skill and daring.

TODAY’S WORDLE ANSWER

Today’s Wordle answer is STUNT.

Yesterday’s Wordle answer

Yesterday’s Wordle answer, Oct. 21, No. 1,585 was DETOX.

Recent Wordle answers

Oct. 17, No. 1,581: GROSS
Oct. 18, No. 1,582: HAVEN
Oct. 19, No. 1,583: IDEAL
Oct. 20, No. 1,584: LIMBO

Quick tips for Wordle

#1: Check our list ranking the popularity of all the letters in the alphabet and choose your starter words accordingly. (TRAIN, STERN and AUDIO are good.)

#2: Don’t forget that letters can be used more than once.

#3: Many words are similar. You don’t want to use up multiple guesses that don’t advance your cause. So if the puzzle is STA_E, don’t guess STARE, STATE and STALE. Guess something that uses that R, T and L, like TWIRL.