The word "trust" is pretty meaningless in a void--if you can't answer "trust to do what?" I think you're missing some nuance to the concept.
For example, I trust my parents to do what they think is best for me, because I have decades of experience showing that is genuinely their goal. But would I trust my father to perform open-heart surgery on me? Absolutely not! The man doesn't have a medical degree of any kind.
With corporations, my trust is largely based on their incentives.
I trust Comcast not to sell my credit card data to Nigerian scammers, because they're clearly making more money by being a cable provider than they would by being a credit card data darknet wholesaler, and selling my credit card data to Nigerian scammers would put their more profitable business at risk.
VPNs... might sell my credit card data to Nigerian scammers, because their profit margins aren't as high and their reputations are already not great.
I don't trust Comcast not to report my metadata to the NSA or to reject MPAA requests for torrent data, because they already did both those things and have incentives to continue.
I trust VPNs to request MPAA requests for torrent data, because as soon as that became known it would hurt their business model. I don't trust VPNs not to report my metadata to the NSA because acting as a honey trap for the NSA could be pretty profitable and probably wouldn't become public, so it wouldn't hurt their business model.
For example, I trust my parents to do what they think is best for me, because I have decades of experience showing that is genuinely their goal. But would I trust my father to perform open-heart surgery on me? Absolutely not! The man doesn't have a medical degree of any kind.
With corporations, my trust is largely based on their incentives.
I trust Comcast not to sell my credit card data to Nigerian scammers, because they're clearly making more money by being a cable provider than they would by being a credit card data darknet wholesaler, and selling my credit card data to Nigerian scammers would put their more profitable business at risk.
VPNs... might sell my credit card data to Nigerian scammers, because their profit margins aren't as high and their reputations are already not great.
I don't trust Comcast not to report my metadata to the NSA or to reject MPAA requests for torrent data, because they already did both those things and have incentives to continue.
I trust VPNs to request MPAA requests for torrent data, because as soon as that became known it would hurt their business model. I don't trust VPNs not to report my metadata to the NSA because acting as a honey trap for the NSA could be pretty profitable and probably wouldn't become public, so it wouldn't hurt their business model.