And to listen in or search through online activity, comms, etc. Nothing is private and these VPN companies over promise in the hope you never find out all of them probably have a government back door.

The phone network had a government electronic back door installed in every phone switch in the early 2000s. Saw it happen. It was "so courts could issue subpoenas and monitor suspects without human intervention at the phone company" but the real purpose was access to everything without anyone knowing or able to stop or see it.

They've gotten the ability to listen prior to that through cooperation with the phone companies and manual intervention. Now they have complete, unfettered access with only keystrokes required and no checks and balances.