This is not about your expectations. This is about the expectations of a user who knows that VPN stands for "Virtual Private Network", and that the feature has the word "Protect" in the title.
FB creates the expectation of privacy by using those terms, and they (or you) don't get out from under that expectation by splitting hairs.
The app places the acryonym "VPN" on the phone and instructs users to turn on the virtual private network.
I'd say users aren't totally out of line thinking that an app providing virtual private networking functionality would use a layperson's definition of private (as opposed to a techie's definition involving network protocols).
I'd argue that a VPN app that isn't private should be required to put something like the warning on cigarettes: >
> WARNING: This app monitors and records for all time your every action on your phone and only protects you from 3rd parties who haven't paid us enough money to get access to your data.
I agree that a VPN service implies it's protecting privacy, but let me nit pick a bit: the "private" in virtual private network is not about privacy, it's about a network with a private IP space, the virtual part is that it operates on top of public IP space.
With that said, anyone could make the assumption that private means privacy here, and most common use cases for consumer VPNs are for privacy, so, I guess it really matters that they are explicit what they service does, and I think the description above is pretty clear.
A VPN has nothing to do with privacy. Changing the definition doesn't do anyone any favors. It just blurs the line even further. Private!== privacy. It isn't some magical protocol that all of a sudden makes you untrackable.
