Everyone seems to be thirsting for your personal data. Your most trusted search engine has no qualms dishing out details of your online activities to third parties who then bombard you with thousands of annoying ads.
As you spend time connecting with friends and family on your various social media apps, these popular apps now have no qualms selling your personal info to the highest bidder.
Hackers and other folks with malicious intent are also spending sleepless nights trying to glean out sensitive data from your network so they can use it to clean out your bank accounts or compromise your online security.
However chilling it may be, you can always do something to keep prying eyes off your private online activities, and one such thing is through the use of a VPN. Here is how you can benefit from a VPN.
Enhanced privacy
The harsh reality is that people just can’t let you be: everyone wants a piece of you. Thugs want to use your identity to steal your money, search engines are already making money by selling your online footprint to advertisers, and some crazy chaps are somewhere trying to break into your system just for fun.
Privacy has become a major issue in the current internet age, and the repercussions are immense if your sensitive data gets into the wrong hands.
Nevertheless, a good VPN should offer you protection from all those repugnant chaps and websites that have no respect for your personal space. A VPN enhances your privacy through the following ways:
● It encrypts your data traffic to and from the websites you visit such prying eyes can’t make any sense of it.
● It hides your IP address so eavesdroppers, including your ISP, can’t tell your location.
● It can also obliterate your online history so no one can trace your online activities.
Solution to censorship
Has it ever occurred to you that some countries may not be as liberal as yours? Some governments don’t take it too kindly to websites that display content that makes them uncomfortable. Such content may be political, social or religious, and so, they will restrict it by putting the plug on those websites.
In some cases, governments may censor certain sites for noble reasons, such as preventing moral decay by banning sites that compromise the moral fabric of the citizenry.
However, a VPN can still unlock censored content by routing traffic via a server in another country where no one has a problem with such content. Keep in mind that VPNs have servers in different countries, and if you block one, one can always access content via another server in a different location.
Window to geo-restricted stuff
You may have noticed that the moment you leave the US, you lose access to certain sites and content. It is possible to block you from some websites depending on your location by reading your IP address.
The servers can use the IP address of your device to determine your location and hence decide whether to allow you access or not. This concept is known as geo-blocking. However, a good VPN, such as IPVanish, will help you circumvent this problem by hiding your IP address, or assigning you a different one, so you appear to be in one country while you are actually in another.
For instance, if you are out of the US but still wish to watch your favorite TV shows, all you have to do is to link up with your VPN which will then connect you to the relevant website via a server inside the US.
Data protection on public WiFi
Don’t be too excited when your smartphone or PC detects the presence of free public Wi-Fi in the vicinity. Such Wi-Fi networks may not be too secure and thugs can exploit the vulnerability to hack into your private data.
So, before you quickly connect into the network to enjoy free internet by checking your mail, getting in touch with your buddies on social media and streaming media, ensure that the VPN is up and running. It will encrypt all your data and make it difficult for unsavory folks from breaking into your data systems and compromising your security.
The Wi-Fi doesn’t have to free to be weak. Some of those wireless networks you have subscribed to are equally vulnerable. Log into them from the safety of the VPN to avoid data security mishaps.
Browse Anonymously
Sometimes you just want to ghost your way through the online world without leaving a trace. It may not be possible without a VPN even with the best of the web browsers you can find.
Though some browsers have a feature for incognito browsing, they don’t obscure your footprint completely as the very websites you visit privately may still track you by silently installing cookies on your system. The best way to browse anonymously to use to connect a VPN but before doing so, ensure that:
● You change the location on the VPN to some imaginary place.
● Configure the VPN to delete any cookies from your system the moment you exit from the web – if the VPN has such settings.
● Check that the VPN is up and running before accessing any website.
Since almost everyone is out to pry your personal data from you, it is essential to have an efficient VPN in place before you go online. The VPN will encrypt all your data traffic, making it unusable to intruders. It will also hide your IP address and allow you to browse anonymously.