A VPN server operated by the Canadian company Windscribe has been seized by law enforcement in the Netherlands. Despite the confiscation, Windscribe states that the server is unlikely to contain any user data due to its strict no-logs policy.

The company announced the incident on social media, posting: “THIS IS NOT A DRILL: The Dutch authorities, without a warrant, just seized one of our VPN servers saying they’ll give it back after they ‘fully analyze it.’” A photo accompanying the post showed an empty slot in a server rack.

According to Windscribe, Dutch authorities took a standard VPN node located in the Netherlands as part of an ongoing investigation, offering no further explanation at the time. The company noted it routinely receives law enforcement inquiries but typically has no data to provide. “This time they didn’t ask, they just snatched the server from the rack to look for the logs themselves. Unfortunately for them, there’s still no logs lol,” the company tweeted.

VPN services enhance privacy and security by encrypting user internet traffic and routing it through remote servers, masking a user’s true location and activity. To safeguard privacy, many providers, including Windscribe, enforce a no-logs policy, ensuring that user connections, timestamps, and IP addresses are not recorded. Windscribe further secures data by using RAM-only servers, which wipe all information upon reboot or shutdown.

Some observers speculate whether the seizure had other motives. Windscribe recently surpassed 100 million registered users, and security researcher John Scott-Railton of the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab noted that specialized equipment exists to keep servers powered during removal, potentially preserving data. “I know nothing more about this case, but keep in mind that hotplugs that let authorities seize a server without cutting power are commonplace,” he tweeted.

Windscribe has responded to the seizure with sarcasm, joking in a tweet: “Windscribe uses RAM disk servers so the only thing the authorities will find is a stock Ubuntu install. The bigger worry is the unredacted Epstein files we had on there…”

The incident follows a similar 2023 attempt by Swedish authorities to seize servers from Mullvad VPN, which was reportedly abandoned after learning of the provider’s no-logs policy. Dutch authorities have yet to comment on the current seizure.