What A VPN Really Means For Your Internet Security
Advertising gone mad has pitched them as the be-all and end-all of internet security. A magic box that can secure and anonymize you online. Of course, this isn’t true. A VPN can certainly help you with your online security, but it’s not a turnkey solution that protects against any attack plane like the YouTube shills would have us believe.
Originally they were a tool used by companies and their employees to extend the office network. The idea is that a client that’s on a network with low trust can connect to a network with high trust via an encrypted tunnel that traverses the public internet. This tunnel is configured in such a way that if a breach is detected, it will close and a completely new path will be plotted through the internet that avoids the area where the risk was detected.
This tunnel is extremely sensitive. Even using a VPN on a network with high latency can result in the tunnel continually rerouting just in case it’s being attacked. Providing everything is set up correctly, there’s little question that the connection between the VPN client and the VPN server is secure.
A virtual private network has two parts. There’s a VPN client and a VPN server. The client is you. It’s software that’s installed on your PC that knows how to communicate with a server. Likewise, a server is another PC that could be anywhere on earth which knows how to communicate with the client. When we are talking about the kinds of VPNs that an individual might buy. Like this VPN free trial, for example, the main reason people use them is to access content that’s blocked in their country. There is state sanction blocking like The Great Firewall of China or the less impressive fire-fences you’ll find in Turkey, Iran, Vietnam, and a few other countries. Then there are services that are blocked and slimmed down in different regions normally because of broadcasting laws.
Everyone knows that Netflix, Hulu, Disney Plus, SkySports, and many other sites are either Geo blocked and completely unavailable in some countries or have less content. The US Netflix catalog is in constant competition with the Japanese catalog and the Irish catalog for the most titles. While other countries have more titles in their local language that aren’t available around the world.
Yes and no. If you’re visiting dirty websites it pays to double wrap. On the other hand, the majority of the internet, upwards of 90%, is already encrypted with HTTPS. The S stands for secure. This protocol uses chains of certificate authorities to ensure that the server you’re talking to is legit and all your information is encrypted.
If you're frequenting dodgy unencrypted websites there are advantages to an additional layer of encryption. Everything you send over unencrypted HTTP is sent as clear text and there are free tools that are publicly available that anyone can use to eavesdrop on your conversation.
When internet packages are sent from your computer, the client, to the VPN server they are unpacked and forwarded onto their final destination. If that final destination is Netflix or Hulu or any other site they can’t tell where the traffic originated from. The VPN routes the traffic over its own ISP so all these sites can see is the public IP address of the VPN server. If that server is based in the US then it looks like the traffic came from there. If the server is on a mountain in outer Mongolia it’s the same story. Some websites keep a list of VPN IP addresses so it’s best not to use a free provider or a provider that’s super popular as it’s more likely that these IP addresses will be on the site’s list.
All the internet service provider is able to see is where it’s sending the traffic to. They will likely know that you are using a VPN because of the inflated size of the packet, and they might have a list of known providers, but who cares, there’s nothing illegal or even questionable about using a VPN. Once the traffic arrives then the VPN server will unwrap the packet and forward it onto its real destination.
In Summary, A VPN is not the only thing that you need to secure your internet connection, and most of the time they are used to watching movies and TV shows that you can’t get in your area. That’s not to say that they are useless for security. When you’re on HTTP sites there are certainly advantages