Surfshark unveils new Dausos VPN protocol with dedicated user tunnels

Surfshark has announced a new proprietary VPN protocol named “Dausos,” claiming it delivers significantly faster speeds and improved security compared to existing standards by assigning each user a dedicated encrypted tunnel.

The company says the protocol has already undergone an independent security audit and is designed to be resilient against future quantum threats.

The announcement outlines Surfshark’s effort to move beyond established protocols such as WireGuard, OpenVPN, and IKEv2, which were originally designed for enterprise environments and later adapted for consumer VPN services. According to the company, Dausos was built from the ground up specifically for individual users, with a focus on reducing inefficiencies associated with shared infrastructure.

Dedicated encryption tunnels

A key architectural change introduced by Dausos is the use of per-user dedicated tunnels rather than the shared tunnels commonly used in other VPN protocols. In typical VPN deployments, multiple users’ traffic is multiplexed over a single encrypted channel, which can introduce overhead and expose cross-traffic. Surfshark states that isolating traffic into separate tunnels reduces interference and improves both performance and security.

Another notable aspect of the protocol is its use of AEGIS-256X2, a less commonly used cryptographic algorithm compared to AES-GCM. Surfshark claims this cipher delivers better performance on modern hardware while maintaining strong security guarantees, including resistance to quantum-computing-based attacks. The company further states that Dausos is “fully post-quantum resilient,” though it has yet to publicly detail the cryptographic implementation or key-exchange mechanisms used to achieve this.

Surfshark says Dausos has undergone an independent audit by Cure53, a well-known German cybersecurity firm that regularly evaluates VPNs and other privacy-focused technologies. However, the full report and its scope were not detailed in the Dausos announcement.

In terms of performance, Surfshark claims Dausos can deliver speeds up to 30% faster than existing protocols. The protocol also includes adaptive performance features that adjust to network conditions and device capabilities, helping maintain stable connections when switching between Wi-Fi and cellular networks.

At launch, Dausos is only available in Surfshark’s macOS application, with broader platform support expected at a later stage. Users can enable the protocol through the app’s VPN settings menu.

While the introduction of a new VPN protocol is notable, proprietary designs often face scrutiny from the security community, particularly when compared to open and extensively reviewed standards like WireGuard. Transparency and peer review are critical factors in assessing long-term trustworthiness, so we will be waiting for independent benchmarks and security audits as they become available.