We solve this with vp.net, by making the service verifiable. The code can be reviewed, the builds are reproducible, and each node can prove what software it’s running and where your traffic actually goes [1].
It doesn’t turn a VPN into an anonymity tool, but it makes trust measurable instead of blind. That’s the part the industry should have fixed a long time ago.
For example, France is spying torrent downloads of copyrighted content but they only look at the domestic consumer ISP IP addresses. They ignore all foreign IPs, so if you're using a VPN it doesn't matter if the VPN keeps all the logs they won't bother.
Of course if you're doing things that will get you personally targeted by the police, like cyber-bullying or CSAM, a VPN won't protect you.
I now believe that you know your use case and use VPN only for that, and decide whether you really need to pay with parts of your kidneys for a service that claims to be the "uber privacy bulwark of the season" (until proven otherwise, as it happens), and get done with it, and make sure "anonymity and privacy" are not the expectations unless you have gone to great lengths to ensure these two, and if that's the case, you won't be in the market for "list most private VPNs providers" at a search or LLM input box.
If your needs are anonymity, a VPN is not going to solve it— in fact, relying on one might endanger you. Even for privacy, I'd be very careful in trusting a VPN (any VPN).
So if you need a VPN for streaming content from other geographies, just get the one at the best cost that does the job well in your geography, without going through the rabbit hole of cryptographic verification, reputation spiral, etc.