That seems to be a major aspect. There are hundreds of VPN services. They compete on many dimensions, such as speed, security, not retaining any logs, and the number of server locations. And some of them have insane numbers of server locations.
Anyway, I've been look it this issue for a while, using ping services (such as asm.ca.com, maplatency.com and ping.pe). For HMA and VyprVPN, only about half of the servers seem to be located where claimed. And HMA claims to have one in North Korea ;)
What I'd be really concerned about is -- how are these VPN services getting their fake locations to show up on Maxmind? Is Maxmind simply taking their word for it when they claim that one of their IP ranges is in North Korea, for instance? Or is there some deeper trickery going on?
I don't know how Avast (HMA) does it. I'm sure that there's more to it than lying to MaxMind etc. I do know that, as long as the ISPs don't object, one can announce an IP from one ISP on another. I also know that one can tunnel ISP uplinks.
HMA (Avast) claims that fnj-kp.prcdn.net is in Manpo, North Korea. MaxMind now reports that two of its IPs (5.62.61.64 and 5.62.61.65) are in Prague, Czechia. And the third (5.62.56.160) in Seattle, WA, US. But ipinfo.io still reports North Korea for all three.
But peering is complicated. There are two ISPs in Zurich, for example, with ~25 msec rtt between them, but ~5 msec ping to other nearby cities. They just don't speak directly it seems.
That seems to be a major aspect. There are hundreds of VPN services. They compete on many dimensions, such as speed, security, not retaining any logs, and the number of server locations. And some of them have insane numbers of server locations.
Anyway, I've been look it this issue for a while, using ping services (such as asm.ca.com, maplatency.com and ping.pe). For HMA and VyprVPN, only about half of the servers seem to be located where claimed. And HMA claims to have one in North Korea ;)
Some