VPNs, what even are they?
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Hello! My name is James Bryant, I am a Writer, Programmer, Artist, and IT guy! I have Dysgraphia, which isn’t Dyslexia. If Dyslexia is getting words from the page, Dysgraphia is getting words on to the page. Pretty funny I became a writer, huh?
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On a lovely platform known as YouTube you may have heard of a little thing called a “VPN,” or Virtual Private Network. VPNs are great for maintaining your privacy online, protecting you from hackers, watching a movie in a different country, and pirating anything you want without your Internet Service Provider (ISP) knowing.
Small problem though: they’re not. Most of the time, VPNs are pretty much useless when it comes to any of the advertised purposes, so what are the use cases for a VPN?
Context: What are VPNs?
VPNs are a type of service that encrypts all data coming from your computer through a VPN client, that then is sent through your ISP, and decrypted by the VPN server. This creates a kind of “Encrypted Tunnel,” the fancy buzzword some salespeople try to use when selling VPNs.
Piracy
Yes, you read that right, piracy. VPNs are great for piracy online. Do you want Final Fantasy CCXXXVI but don’t want to spend the money to buy it? Well, get a VPN, don your 19th century seafaring paraphernalia, and pirate it! VPNs are absolutely fabulous at enabling piracy as they promise complete anonymity... Key word there is promise.
Something to note about VPNs is that there is no way to know whether or not they actually give complete anonymity. In all likelihood they don’t, but you can’t know that for certain.
When you send something, post something, or do anything online whatsoever, it has to go through your ISP; a VPN encrypts and decrypts your data through its server/client, allowing the VPN to store data. So, who do you trust more, T-Mobile or NordVPN? AT&T or ExpressVPN? One of them says they’ll protect your data, and may or may not actually do that; another doesn’t hide the fact they do monitor what comes through for later.
VPNs will protect you from hackers...
Yes, with a VPN you will be more protected from hackers while on public WiFi. If there were any to begin with. Public WiFi has progressively become safer from people who may hack. That’s not to say you shouldn’t be careful using it, but with things like WPA 3/2 and AES, you are fairly safe.
When you are online browsing at home and using a VPN, it is very unlikely that you are actively being hacked. Most hackers are not attempting to breech a random home computer like yours. Why? Because you are simply not worth it. The most likely place for your computer to be hacked is via malware that you download yourself. Why actively hack a personal computer, when plenty of people are gullible enough to just download “free” software?
However, if you work remotely for a company you may be required to use their Corporate VPN, which does protect your data. This is extremely important, for if the companies data is compromised they can lose a lot of money.
Watching a movie in a different country
Fortunately, watching movies does not have any caveats. You can use VPNs to watch movies in a different country; if you live in the U.S. or the EU, however, a majority of movies are available to you, which makes this point moot for most people.
When are VPNs actually useful?
Well, my astute reader, you may have noticed by now that almost all the advertised uses for VPNs are rather pointless, and the most useful parts of VPNs are illegal. However, that doesn’t mean that there are no legal reasons for utilizing VPNs; in fact, the more entrepreneurial of you may want to start taking notes.
VPNs, while fairly terrible for personal use, are incredible for businesses. Not only do they allow your company’s information to be secure across the web, as stated previously, but employees can now work remotely and access local file shares in the office seamlessly. VPNs for corporations are one of the reasons Work From Home jobs are even possible now.
Conclusion
If there is one thing you should take away from this whole thing, unless you plan on sailing the seven seas of the internet and flying your virtual Jolly Roger, you probably don’t need a VPN. They are pretty useful for corporations and can be valuable in a field like investigative journalism, but most people shouldn’t waste their money on VPNs. Instead, they should utilize a free service called: Common Sense.