What is a VPN good for?

Between WiFi spying, internet hackers and honeypot attacks – public networks have become a dangerous place to surf. So, rather than using public networks and begging for nothing to happen, be smart and use a VPN.

Although VPN technology was initially developed to allow corporate employees to securely connect to their work networks to access them when away from the office, VPN connections are primarily used to hide internet activity, thus ensuring privacy and privacy. bypassing local or government censorship (From work, school, state, etc.), to avoid hackers when using public WiFi and to “trick” websites into thinking you are browsing from another geographic location, to access websites limited to users in certain countries, states or regions.

How does a VPN work?

Just as a firewall protects your computer information, a VPN protects your data online. Although a VPN is a WAN (Wide Area Network), the good part is that it offers the same security, appearance, and functionality as a private network. VPNs can be either with remote access (connecting a computer to a network) or site-to-site (connecting two networks between them).

When browsing without a VPN, you are actually connecting to the Internet Service Provider (ISP), which in turn connects to the site of your choice. This means that all your internet activity goes through their servers and can be monitored by them.

When browsing a VPN, traffic passes through the VPN server using an encrypted “tunnel”. This means that it is not accessible to anyone except you and the VPN server. That being said, there is a difference between intimacy and anonymity. Using a VPN does not make you anonymous, because the VPN provider knows who you are and can see your activity online. However, it ensures your confidentiality with your ISP, at school or at the workplace and even with the government. To ensure that your privacy is truly protected by your VPN service provider, it is essential to choose a “no sign-up” provider. If the VPN provider keeps the activity logs, the authorities can request them or view them, which means that the information will no longer be private.

It should be noted that even if the provider is committed to keeping no logs, it can monitor the online activity in real-time when needed, for example, for technical reasons, such as troubleshooting. Although most VPN providers will not monitor the activity in real-time, most countries are legally entitled to force any VPN provider to start keeping logs for any individual user, without warning the respective user. However, if you do not run away from authorities for illegal online activities, you probably have no reason to worry.

In addition to choosing a “no record” VPN service provider, you also want to make sure that the provider you choose uses shared IPs, which means that many different users have the same IP address. This makes it infinitely more difficult for any third party to identify with online behavior.

Can I use a VPN on my mobile device?

While VPNs are fully supported by both iOS and Android and will fully protect you while accessing websites for P2P download, the mobile apps you install on your phone have access to other data outside. IP address and can easily reach your online activity. This includes GPS location, contact list, application store ID, etc. The collected data is then sent directly by these applications to the parent companies, effectively bypassing your VPN.

Therefore, when you subscribe to a VPN service, in order to enjoy all the benefits of VPN using your mobile device, it is important to access websites only through web pages or interfaces using an open-source browser (such as Firefox) that is user-friendly and never confidential. dedicated applications.

If you want to learn more about using VPNs on your smartphone, check out our list of Best & Worst VPNs for Android and Best & Worst VPNs for iOS.

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