VPS logging issues?

Question

So people recommend a VPS (cloud) offshore, in order to ensure that a VPN provider is not logging or doing anything malicious.

But isn't VPN provider = VPS hosting company? There is still a third party involved... Can they keep data and logs of sites visited and connection times (without having to install a software on my VPS)?

Answer 1

Yes, I think that is what people are actually talking about. And yes, they can.

Eavesdropping and logging can occur anywhere from the source to the destination unless you use encryption (against eavesdropping) and anonymisation (against logging, kinda...)