Surfshark B.V.

What is Surfshark?

Surfshark B.V. is a cybersecurity company headquartered in Amsterdam, best known for its consumer VPN. It also operates the Incogni data removal service, antivirus, breach monitoring, and identity protection tools sold through subscriptions.

Who owns Surfshark?

Surfshark operates under a shared holding company created when it merged with Nord Security in 2022. Founder Vytautas Kaziukonis established the company in 2018, and it remains privately held.

Is Surfshark a public company?

No. Surfshark is privately held under its holding company structure with Nord Security. Neither entity is listed on a stock exchange.

When was Surfshark founded?

Surfshark was founded in 2018 by Vytautas Kaziukonis, initially as a VPN browser extension product. It relocated its legal registration to the Netherlands in October 2021.

Where is Surfshark based?

Surfshark is legally headquartered in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Its largest operational offices are in Vilnius and Kaunas, Lithuania, with additional offices in Warsaw and Berlin.

Does Surfshark own Incogni?

Yes. Incogni is a Surfshark product, created inside the company in 2021 and launched publicly in January 2022. It is sold as a standalone subscription and bundled inside Surfshark One+.

Surfshark was founded in 2018 by Vytautas Kaziukonis. Its first product was the Surfshark VPN, launched initially as browser extensions and then as applications across desktop and mobile platforms. The company passed its first independent security audit by Cure53 in its founding year.

Early growth was built on aggressive pricing. Surfshark positioned itself as a low-cost unlimited-device VPN, undercutting established competitors while investing heavily in review-site visibility and YouTube sponsorships. By 2021 it had accumulated more than 200 employees and published its first annual report.

In October 2021 the company relocated its legal headquarters from the British Virgin Islands to the Netherlands. In 2021 it also launched Incogni, the personal data removal product that would later become a core part of its subscription bundle.

In early 2022 Surfshark merged with Nord Security, the parent of NordVPN, under a shared holding company. The combination was valued at approximately $1.6 billion and granted the combined group unicorn status. The terms kept Surfshark and NordVPN operating as independent businesses with separate infrastructure and product roadmaps.

Post-merger, Surfshark expanded beyond VPN. It launched Nexus, a network technology, built a research center, introduced Alternative ID and Alternative Number for identity protection, and in 2024 acquired Ironwall, a data removal service focused on judges, law enforcement, and public servants. Its 2024 wrap-up reported more than three million users and roughly 430 employees at that time, with headcount continuing to grow.

Surfshark's ethical positioning centers on privacy practice rather than environmental sustainability. It operates under a no-logs policy verified through independent audits, including assessments by Cure53 and Deloitte. Its Dutch jurisdiction places it under GDPR obligations, and the company publishes transparency reporting.

The company is a member of the Internet Society and supports open internet advocacy. Its acquisition of Ironwall extended data removal protection to public servants including judges and law enforcement, a mission-adjacent social dimension unusual in consumer cybersecurity.

Surfshark's record is relatively clean by VPN industry standards. Its most discussed governance matter is jurisdictional: critics have periodically noted that a company founded in the British Virgin Islands and majority staffed in Lithuania raises questions about ultimate accountability, questions it addressed by relocating registration to the Netherlands in 2021 and submitting to GDPR.

Category-level scrutiny applies. Consumer VPN marketing across the industry has drawn regulatory attention for overstating anonymity, and Surfshark's claims are subject to the same standards. No major regulatory enforcement action or breach affecting Surfshark customer data is on record.