Political Domain Audit: ExpressVPN

Audit Phase: Political (Political / Governance Forensics) Subject Entity: Express VPN International Ltd (BVI), a brand of Kape Technologies (privately held; ultimately controlled by Teddy Sagi via Unikmind Holdings Limited, Isle of Man) Audit Date: June 2026 Evidence Base: Published corporate disclosures, the company’s own blog and Rights Center, Israeli and international business press (Globes, Calcalist/CTech, The Times of Israel), US Department of Justice and national-press court reporting, NGO and campaign-group materials, and the BDS National Committee’s published guidance. This audit is a forensic evidence inventory only. No scoring, weighting, or interpretive conclusion is drawn here.

Corporate Communications & Public Stance

Official Position on the Israel-Palestine Conflict

No public evidence was identified of any named, dated corporate statement by ExpressVPN or its parent Kape Technologies addressing the 7 October 2023 Hamas attack, the subsequent Israeli military operations in Gaza, or the Israel-Palestine conflict as a geopolitical matter. ExpressVPN’s “Rights Center,” reviewed in June 2026, addresses censorship circumvention, surveillance, and support for activists and journalists in general terms; it carries Ukrainian-language guidance for “people at borders or in conflict zones” and references support for Ukrainian refugees, but contains no content specific to Israel, Gaza, Palestine, or the documented Gaza internet blackouts.¹

Comparative Responsiveness

Following Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, ExpressVPN published a named interview on its official blog (dated 6 April 2023) featuring Kateryna Balaban, Managing Director of Linking Help, describing ExpressVPN’s partnership with the UA.SUPPORT pro-bono legal platform and its provision of complimentary VPN service to volunteer lawyers and Ukrainian refugees/asylum seekers; the interview frames VPNs as a tool to protect “the privacy and safety of asylum seekers and refugees.”² No comparable named statement, free-service commitment, or NGO partnership relating to Gaza, Palestinian civil society, or Palestinian digital-rights organisations was identified in ExpressVPN’s or Kape’s public communications during the October 2023 conflict. The contrast is recorded here as a factual matter of the corporate communications record, not as an inference.

Market & Investor Framing of Israel Operations

In Kape’s investor and acquisition communications, Israel is presented as a country of operational presence (R&D / development) rather than as a commercial sales market; ExpressVPN’s consumer-facing product communications do not reference Israeli operations or partnerships.³ No special geopolitical, partnership, or solidarity language toward the Israeli state was identified in reviewed public-facing ExpressVPN or Kape disclosures.

Operations in Occupied or Contested Territories

No public evidence was identified of ExpressVPN or Kape Technologies operating server infrastructure, offices, or service contracts specifically within Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank or other internationally recognised occupied territories. Kape’s documented Israeli operational footprint is a development centre at the Azrieli Sarona Tower (LABS 91-95), Tel Aviv, located within the internationally recognised State of Israel.⁴³

No public evidence was identified of a distinct ExpressVPN or Kape corporate policy stance, public position, or governance instrument relating to the Occupied Palestinian Territories or to settlement activity. ExpressVPN and Kape are not named in the UN OHCHR database of business enterprises involved in activities relating to settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (the database listing 158 enterprises in the September 2025 update); no public evidence was identified of ExpressVPN or Kape appearing in that database in any edition.⁵⁶ No public evidence was identified of ExpressVPN or Kape political advocacy for or against settlement trade.

Internal Governance, Content & Retail Policies

Employee Relations and Speech

No public evidence identified. No legal actions, employment-tribunal decisions, or press-reported controversies were found involving ExpressVPN or Kape Technologies enforcement of employee speech, political symbols, or labour organising specifically relating to the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Content / Editorial Policy

Kape Technologies owns VPN review and comparison media properties, including vpnMentor and Wizcase (acquired via Webselenese) and SafetyDetectives, alongside the consumer VPN brands it reviews (ExpressVPN, CyberGhost, Private Internet Access).³⁷ An independent boycott-tracking site (is-boycott.com) records the criticism that Kape “updated their VPN rankings following the acquisition, raising Kape-owned VPNs while dropping competitors,” characterising this as a structural conflict of interest.⁷ No independent academic study, regulatory inquiry, or journalist investigation was identified documenting algorithmic suppression or editorial bias specifically related to Israel-Palestine or Gaza-internet-blackout coverage on these platforms.

Retail & Supply Chain

ExpressVPN is a digital-services company and does not manufacture or retail physical goods subject to country-of-origin labelling or settlement-product import regulations. No public evidence was identified of regulatory action against the company relating to physical goods.

Brand Heritage & State Partnerships

Corporate Origin - Crossrider / Adware Legacy

The corporate predecessor to Kape Technologies was Crossrider, founded in Tel Aviv in 2011 by Koby Menachemi and Shmuel (Shmueli) Achdut/Gonen as a browser-extension SDK with monetisation features. Teddy Sagi acquired Crossrider in late 2012 for approximately $37 million, after which it listed on London’s AIM market.⁸ Wikipedia records that Crossrider’s services became “increasingly utilized by malware and adware developers” and that the company struggled to prevent misuse of its platform; it rebranded as Kape Technologies plc in March 2018 alongside its pivot into consumer VPNs.⁸ ExpressVPN’s consumer brand does not reference this corporate heritage.

Kape Leadership & IDF Background

Kape Technologies Group CEO Ido Erlichman served as a captain in Duvdevan, described by Calcalist/CTech as “an elite Israeli undercover counterterrorist commando unit”; the same profile records the 2002 death of his commander, Lieutenant Colonel Eyal Weiss, “during an operation that went awry.”⁹ Erlichman co-authored the bestseller Battle of Strategies (Yedioth Books, 2014, >10,000 copies sold), about his Duvdevan service; due to military censorship the authors were listed pseudonymously as “Ido and Einav.”⁹ Erlichman joined Kape as Group CEO in 2016.⁹ ExpressVPN’s consumer-facing advertising makes no reference to this background.

Co-founder Koby Menachemi is described in secondary and activist sources as having served as a developer in IDF Unit 8200 (signals intelligence) before founding Crossrider.¹⁰¹¹ No primary-source corroboration (e.g. a first-party interview or named filing) of this specific service claim was identified; it is recorded here as reported by those sources and not independently verified at primary-source level.

Marketing & Brand Associations

ExpressVPN is a documented sponsor of The Ben Shapiro Show (The Daily Wire), offering a dedicated discount route (expressvpn.com/ben); the arrangement is recorded as a standard commercial podcast-advertising/affiliate relationship.¹² No public evidence was identified of ExpressVPN or Kape accepting Israeli state honours, formally hosting Israeli government officials in a non-commercial capacity, or sponsoring Israeli government public-diplomacy (“Brand Israel”) campaigns. No public evidence identified for those sub-categories.

Lobbying, Advocacy, Financing & Logistics

Political Lobbying & Donations

No public evidence was identified of lobbying registrations for ExpressVPN or Kape Technologies in US (Lobbying Disclosure Act / FARA), UK, or EU transparency registers relating to Israel-Palestine policy, BDS legislation, or Middle East foreign policy. No public evidence was identified of ExpressVPN or Kape corporate membership of, or funding for, pro-Israel lobbying organisations.

Ultimate-Owner Philanthropy Directed to Israeli Military-Welfare Causes

The ultimate beneficial owner of Kape/ExpressVPN, Teddy Sagi, is documented in Israeli business press as a donor to Israeli military-welfare causes (these are personal philanthropic acts by the owner, recorded here for completeness; see Executive & Leadership Footprint for the individual record):

• On 19 November 2023, Sagi donated NIS 1 million to singer Omer Adam’s “Returning Soldiers” initiative, a fund providing taxi transport for soldiers on leave during the Gaza conflict; the donation was announced via Adam’s Instagram, which quoted Sagi’s wish “to bring all our righteous soldiers home.”¹³
• At an April 2019 event at LABS Azrieli Sarona, Tel Aviv, Sagi was reported to have donated $3 million to finance scholarships for discharged IDF soldiers through programmes including “From Uniform to Studies” and IMPACT!; the report names Friends of the IDF (FIDF) and the Association for the Wellbeing of Israeli Soldiers among involved bodies, and scholarship recipients were offered jobs at Sagi Group companies.¹⁴

Crisis Asset Mobilisation

No public evidence was identified of ExpressVPN or Kape Technologies directing corporate logistics, infrastructure, free services, or physical assets to Israeli state, military, or state-aligned efforts during or after October 2023.

Corporate Structure & Primary Mission

Foundational Structure

ExpressVPN (Express VPN International Ltd) was founded in the British Virgin Islands in 2009 by Peter Burchhardt and Dan Pomerantz; the BVI domicile is documented as chosen for its lack of mandatory data-retention requirements. Its stated corporate mission is the provision of consumer VPN services.¹⁵¹⁶

Acquisition, Privatisation & Ownership

Kape Technologies completed its acquisition of ExpressVPN for approximately $936 million in September 2021.¹⁷¹⁶ In February 2023 Unikmind Holdings Limited - controlled by Israeli-Cypriot businessman Teddy Sagi, who already held approximately 54.8% of Kape’s share capital - launched a cash offer (290 pence per share) valuing Kape at roughly $1.6 billion; the offer achieved a 98.54% acceptance rate, and Kape was delisted from London’s AIM market by end-May 2023, becoming a wholly private entity.¹⁸ Following privatisation, Kape was reported to have laid off roughly 180 employees (about 12% of its workforce) in July 2023.¹⁹

No golden shares, state shareholdings, sovereign-wealth-fund investments, or government equity stakes were identified in any regulatory filing for Kape Technologies or ExpressVPN; the ownership structure is private commercial in nature, and no Israeli (or other) state entity holds a documented equity or governance interest.¹⁸

Executive & Leadership Footprint

Teddy Sagi - Ultimate Beneficial Owner

Teddy Sagi controls Kape Technologies (and thereby ExpressVPN) through Unikmind Holdings Limited as ultimate beneficial owner.¹⁸ His documented donations to Israeli military-welfare causes (the November 2023 “Returning Soldiers” taxi fund and the 2019 IDF-veteran scholarship programmes) are catalogued under Lobbying, Advocacy, Financing & Logistics above.¹³¹⁴ No public statement by Sagi specifically addressing the Israel-Palestine conflict as a geopolitical position, beyond the soldier-welfare donation framing, was identified. No public evidence identified.

Ido Erlichman - Group CEO, Kape Technologies

Erlichman’s service as a captain in the IDF Duvdevan unit and his authorship of a book about that service are documented in the Calcalist/CTech profile.⁹ No public statements, op-eds, or social-media posts by Erlichman specifically regarding the Gaza conflict or the Israel-Palestine situation were identified. No public evidence identified for personal advocacy on this topic.

Koby Menachemi - Co-Founder, Crossrider/Kape

Menachemi co-founded Crossrider in 2011 and exited the company in 2016.⁸¹⁰ His reported IDF Unit 8200 service appears in secondary and activist sources and was not independently corroborated at primary-source level (see Brand Heritage above).¹⁰¹¹ No further documented public activity related to Israel-Palestine was identified.

Daniel Gericke - Former CIO, ExpressVPN

Gericke, then ExpressVPN’s Chief Information Officer, was one of three former US intelligence/military personnel (with Marc Baier and Ryan Adams) who entered a deferred prosecution agreement with the US Department of Justice announced on 14 September 2021, agreeing to pay a combined $1,685,000 (Gericke individually $335,000) in connection with “Project Raven,” computer-network-exploitation (“hacking”) operations carried out for the UAE government between 2016 and 2019 in violation of US export-control law.²⁰²¹ This matter is unrelated to the Israel-Palestine conflict and is recorded as a material governance item. ExpressVPN publicly stated it remained “confident… in Daniel’s desire and ability to contribute to our mission.”²¹

Peter Burchhardt & Dan Pomerantz - ExpressVPN Co-Founders

No public statements, advocacy-organisation board memberships, or philanthropic activities related to the Israel-Palestine conflict were identified for either founder.¹⁵ No public evidence identified.

Civil-Society Boycott Designations (Owner-Linked)

Consumer-facing campaign sources flag ExpressVPN on ownership grounds rather than on any act of the brand itself: the Boycat app/blog calls for a boycott (#BoycottExpressVPN), citing Kape’s ownership by Teddy Sagi, Sagi’s 2023 donation to transport soldiers during the Gaza war, and the IDF backgrounds of Menachemi (Unit 8200) and Erlichman (Duvdevan).¹⁰ The Masjid Al-Aqsa boycott page issues its own boycott recommendation based on the Kape/Sagi ownership link and does not assert that ExpressVPN appears on any official BDS list.²² The independent is-boycott.com tracker lists ExpressVPN, CyberGhost, PIA and ZenMate on similar ownership and IDF-donation grounds.⁷ ExpressVPN and Kape are not named anywhere in the BDS National Committee’s “Guide to BDS Boycott & Pressure Corporate Priority Targeting” (published 6 December 2024) - whose targets include Chevron, Intel, Dell, Siemens, HP, Microsoft, Carrefour, AXA, Reebok, Disney+, SodaStream and RE/MAX - nor on the BNC’s “What to Boycott” page.²³²⁴ No documented response from ExpressVPN or Kape to any of these civil-society designations was identified.

End Notes