Migrating GCP Compute Engine to AnubizHost
Google Cloud Platform is solid infrastructure but US-incorporated and subject to US legal process. For privacy-sensitive workloads or just predictable flat-rate billing, this guide walks through moving a GCE instance to an AnubizHost offshore VPS in Romania, Iceland, or Netherlands.
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Inventory the GCE Instance
From the GCP console or with gcloud compute instances describe INSTANCE, capture machine type (n1-standard-2, e2-medium, etc.), zone, attached persistent disks, network tags, service accounts, and firewall rules.
Map GCE machine types to AnubizHost: e2-small (2 vCPU, 2GB) to VPS II, n2-standard-4 (4 vCPU, 16GB) to VPS V. Custom machine types map flexibly - open a sales ticket if you need exact specs.
Provision AnubizHost Target
Order an offshore VPS. Pay with BTC or XMR. Activation is automated. Install matching packages and replicate firewall rules with ufw or nftables - GCP firewall tags translate to source/dest CIDR rules.
Set up GCP service account replacement: if your GCE instance used a service account for GCS or Pub/Sub, generate a service account JSON key and store it on the AnubizHost target. For GCS-only access, you can keep using the GCP key against GCS from the new VPS, or migrate buckets to MinIO on AnubizHost.
Transfer Filesystem and Persistent Disks
Standard rsync from running GCE instance:
rsync -aHAXv --numeric-ids --delete \
--exclude={"/dev","/proc","/sys","/tmp","/run","/mnt","/media","/lost+found"} \
/ root@NEW_IP:/
For attached persistent disks (data volumes), mount on the source and rsync each separately. GCP egress is ~$0.12/GB to the public internet - budget this for multi-TB workloads.
DNS Cutover and Load Balancer Replacement
If you use Cloud DNS, update A records to the AnubizHost IP. If you use a GCP Load Balancer (HTTP(S), TCP, or UDP), replace with HAProxy or nginx on a small AnubizHost VPS, or use Cloudflare's load balancer for a managed alternative.
Re-issue Let's Encrypt. Keep GCE instance running for 7 days as rollback. Delete the instance and persistent disks separately - persistent disks are billed independently.
Cost and Jurisdiction Comparison
GCP egress fees and sustained-use discounts make pricing complex. A small GCE instance often runs $30-60/mo all-in. AnubizHost flat-rate offshore VPS at $17.90-$74.90/mo is predictable. Jurisdiction moves from US to Romania/Iceland/Netherlands. Related reading: offshore VPS, GCS migration, switching from GCP.
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