I know I’m really late to this thread:
The 3 VPNs I’d recommend for privacy are Proton, AirVPN, and Mullvad.
When it comes to torrenting, AirVPN is probably the best. It has port forwarding, a no logging policy, and general trust in the community. Proton is similar, but it’s port forwarding is not as good as AirVPN’s version.
When it comes to privacy, Mullvad is the best imo. You can pay in cash. They removed port forwarding recently, but they’re in a privacy oriented country, and when authorities raided them, they had none of the users’ data (the raid being the reason for port forwarding to disappear).
You don’t need port forwarding to torrent, but without it, you may have slower speeds and trouble downloading older/rarer torrents (it effects the number of seeders/peers you can connect to). I’ve been torrenting without port forwarding and have yet to run into a torrent I can’t download in a reasonable time. Highly overrated imo, but incredibly important if you want to seed (I’ve still had no problems, there might be a couple leeches, but the vast majority can be seeded to). Considering you have Comcast, however, I’m guessing you have a data cap, and with that seeding becomes rather difficult. If you really want to pass it on with the data cap, than a seedbox would be the easiest way. Without port forwarding or a seedbox, and especially with a datacap without either of those, you won’t be able to use private trackers (personally I don’t recommend them unless you can’t find content anywhere else, my advice running counter to many in the piracy community).
You’re not going wrong with any of those 3 VPNs. Mullvad for privacy (torrents work just fine, don’t believe the people convincing you otherwise, and if you’re concerned with seeding, then a seedbox will take care of uploading for you). AirVPN if you want a good privacy reputation and port forwarding, or Proton if you prefer them (their privacy is fine, their port forwarding is inferior).
I’ll also mention Windscribe, which is not as good as the above three, and I don’t know as much about. But it’s the only other one I can think of that might be worth it, though I strongly recommend one of the above 3 first.
Stay away from (most VPNS pay for advertising or astroturf, so always be careful when selecting):
PIA (yes, they were proven not to log… And then bought out by Kape (former name Crossrider), a spyware company. The parent company is not privacy oriented, no matter how much PIA simps want you to believe otherwise. Look into it yourself. I loved PIA before they were bought out!)
NordVPN (lol, just stay away, trust me. You can always search for previous NordVPN incidents.).
I know I’m really late to this thread, lol:
As someone with a hacked V1 Switch: There’s no cons as long as you follow the guides. If you do the initial hardware part of the hack wrong, you can cause a brick, so be careful if you use a paperclip (it’s unlikely as long as you follow the guides, but if you poke the wrong pins then you’ll have issues). To be safe (you absolutely don’t have to, though), I’d recommend buying a premade jig (one of the hacking subs used to have a guy that sold them for about $4 with shipping included).
As others have said, you can run the emunand and keep it offline to prevent a ban. If you are banned by Nintendo, you simply won’t be able to access their online services.
I highly suggest hacking it, it’s been one of the best hacked consoles I’ve had (3DS with the custom themes was funner though, but I’ve also got a Wii U and PS4 that are hacked). The best part of a hacked Switch is mods, though. Modded Breath of the Wild, Tears of the Kingdom, Super Mario Odyssey, Smash Ultimate, Mario Kart 8, Skyrim, Fire Emblem Three Houses, Fire Emblem Engage, etc.
The piracy community tends to recommend Tinfoil (for installing games), but unless things have changed (closed source, dev isn’t the greatest guy), I’d avoid it and use Awoo instead (Goldleaf is fine, but doesn’t check files). You don’t need Shops at the moment to find games (access by using Tinfoil), but if you don’t use them, you do need a good adblocker and adsbypasser (like Fast Forward). I’m not a fan of shops personally, but I believe there are some that have saves, so you may eventually want to look into that. Unfortunately, a lot of Switch Piracy is locked to discord (which I won’t use), so I can’t provide you with much more information on shops.