Hands-on VPN and antivirus testing wrapped in real security journalism, but by its own ownership structure the site's parent and the market-leading products it ranks (NordVPN, Surfshark) trace to the same founders.
What it's really for A security-news outlet with hands-on VPN and antivirus testing, monetized by affiliate links.
What our grade covers The grade on this page is about its in-house VPN and antivirus test rankings, not everything the site does.
High Scoring Confidence Checked against primary sources. We are confident in the facts and the grade here.
Revenue comes from affiliate commissions on recommended security products; Cybernews discloses it "may earn affiliate commissions," and its parent Mediatech sits within the Tesonet group whose founders also founded Nord Security (NordVPN, Surfshark), creating a structural tie between the reviewer and leading reviewed brands.
Source →- Operating since
- 2018 (8 years) · source
- What it costs you
- Free to read The reviews are free to read.
- How they make money
- Security and tech news outlet that publishes in-house, hands-on VPN/antivirus reviews and rankings monetized through affiliate commissions.
- What they do
- It runs first-hand lab tests of VPNs and antivirus tools (speed, leak, and feature testing) alongside cybersecurity reporting, then ranks the products with affiliate links.
- What to watch for
- The catch readers should know: the site's parent company shares founders with Nord Security, maker of NordVPN and Surfshark, which Cybernews reviews and typically ranks at the top, and that common ownership is not flagged near the rankings.
- Composite score
- 2.60 / 5.00 → grade C+
How the grade was reached
Does the site take money from the very entities it ranks? Pay-for-placement, vendor-funded data, and affiliate commissions all pull this down. The less the ranking can be bought, the higher the score.
What is the ranking actually built on? Hands-on testing scores highest, then verified first-hand reviews, then opinion or popularity surveys and self-reported figures, then pay-to-rank, which scores lowest.
Is the methodology published, specific, and reproducible? Can a reader see how a given rank was reached, or is it a black box?
Are commercial relationships, sponsorships, and affiliate arrangements disclosed clearly and near the rankings themselves, rather than buried?
How hard is it to game? Controls against fake reviews, solicited reviews, and vendor gaming raise this; an open box anyone can stuff lowers it.
Evidence
- Tesonet's founders Tomas Okmanas and Eimantas Sabaliauskas; businesses kick-started or accelerated by Tesonet include Nord Security, Surfshark, and Mediatech, which operates Cybernews and Healthnews — placing the review site and the VPN brands it ranks under the same founding group. Source: Wikipedia: Tesonet →
- Cybernews discloses on its NordVPN review page that it may earn affiliate commissions for recommended products, and states its in-house expert team tests products directly for speed, privacy, and streaming. Source: Cybernews NordVPN Review →
- Cybernews describes a standardized 'How We Test' process in which an in-house research team conducts hands-on product testing supplemented by independent test-lab results and user reviews. Source: Cybernews: How We Test →