Quad9

Quad9 is a Swiss charitable foundation in Zürich, registered as Quad9 c/o SWITCH with UID CHE-435.091.407 and supervised by the Federal Department of Home Affairs. Its registered purpose is explicitly non-commercial: free services that improve the privacy, security and stability of internet use. A Swiss Stiftung has no shareholders and no members, so there is nobody above the foundation to acquire it — the ownership question terminates at the entity itself.

The service began in 2017 as a joint effort of the Global Cyber Alliance, IBM Security and Packet Clearing House, which still supplies much of the network footprint; IBM donated the 9.9.9.9 address. The foundation was constituted in Switzerland in 2021 and is funded by donations and sponsorship rather than by selling data or advertising. It lists roughly fifteen named staff and an extended team, plus a five-person foundation council and a statutory auditor on the register.

Switzerland is load-bearing rather than decorative here. Quad9 publishes two Swiss findings of law it has obtained: the Post and Telecommunications Surveillance Service holds that the surveillance act does not apply to it, and OFCOM holds that it is not a telecommunications service under the Telecommunications Act. Between them those remove any retention or customer-identification obligation, and foreign legal demands have to travel through a mutual legal assistance treaty to the Swiss Federal Office of Justice.