We'll look at what even is a VPN? What are some of the advantages disadvantages, and there are some definite drawbacks. Then we'll look at who some of the best free providers are. All right, let's check this out. First off, what even is VPN? Vpn stands for virtual private network. At a very, very simple level, when you use a VPN, your internet service provider, so let's say a Comcast or Verizon, they no longer know what websites you're visiting. Also, the websites that you visit, they now only know the location of the VPN server.
They can no longer see what your actual city and country is that you're visiting from. Okay, but why? Well, There are three main benefits to using a VPN, and first off, it may give you access to additional entertainment content. Here, just as an example, you can see how much content is available in various Netflix markets. Here you see in Slovakia, Slovakia, you get over 7,000 movies and TV shows, compared to the US where you get under 6,000. If you could fake your location to connect through Slovakia, you can watch more movies and TV shows. Second, you can also get around local censorship.
Just as an example, if you happen to live in China, you don't have access to YouTube, the New York Times, or even Facebook Messenger. But if you connect to a VPN, the government only knows that you're connecting to a VPN, and you can now use all of those different services. As an example, one of my favorite YouTubers, Jeff Hsu, he is based out of China, and he's building up his own YouTube channel. Thanks to the magic of VPN, we're able to enjoy his content. Third, you also get some security and privacy benefits. Your internet service provider no longer knows what websites you're visiting. But doesn't the VPN know what websites you're visiting?
Most VPNs claim that they don't keep any logs. However, this could be changing. Just as an example, in India, the government is now mandating that VPN services keep logs. Depending on your market, this may change. It sounds like there are some good benefits. Are there any downsides to using a VPN? Yeah, there are a few. First off, you have to install an app on your computer, and that's going to consume some system resources.
Also, because you've now introduced an extra step every single time you When you, say, head to a website, it's going to slow things down. There's going to be a little bit more latency. Your upload and download speeds won't be quite as fast. Now that we know what a VPN is and also what some of the benefits are, let's take a look at some of the free options. At number one, we have the Opera Web browser. This is a Chromium-based browser just like Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge, and it has a VPN built directly into it, and it's entirely free to use.
Now, Now, funny enough, Opera is now owned by a consortium of Chinese investors, a country where people don't have internet freedom. But yet, they made a VPN for their browser. Once you finish installing Opera, you'll see a browser that looks like this. To enable the VPN, let's click on the settings icon in the top right-hand corner. When you scroll down a little bit, you'll see a button that allows you to enable VPN in settings. Let's click on that. This opens up a prompt warning us that this may affect your connection speed. Let's click on I understand. Right here, you'll see a toggle to either enable or disable the VPN.
Once you enable it, you can now type in a website address, and this will use the VPN. Right up here in the address field, you'll see an icon that says VPN, and it'll be blue indicating that it's currently active. If you click on this, you can confirm that it is active. You can also see how much data has been transferred captured through the VPN. Down at the very bottom, you can also choose your VPN server location. In the top right-hand corner, you can click on the settings gear, and this will once again bring you back to the VPN settings. Opera also offers a pro version that gives you access to even more servers. Now, you might be thinking, how could they possibly offer this for free? There is a cost involved in, first off, making a browser and then also offering free VPN. Well, most browsers make money off searching search engine agreements.
Whenever people launch browsers, there's a default search engine set, and search engine companies pay a significant amount of money for that traffic. By adding this feature into Opera, it makes the browser more attractive, so you get more people using It, and the more people who use it, the more money they can make off these search engine agreements. Interestingly, some other browsers are also looking at adding free VPN. For example, Microsoft recently posted a support article that shows you how to turn on VPN within the Edge browser. It's not available yet, but when it is, they're going to give you 1 gigabyte of data per month. Now, overall, having it built into your web browser is a pretty nice option since that's where you tend to spend most of your time online.
But once again, it requires that you change your default browser. If you're already using Opera or you're already using Edge, this may be a good option. But if you're not, there are some other options that may be better. At number two, we have the app Siphon. This was originally developed in the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. Its main goal is to help you get around internet censorship. On the website, click on Get Siphon, and you can install it on pretty much any major platform. I'll select the one for Windows. The neat thing on Windows is it'll download an exe, but when you click on it, it'll simply run it and it doesn't install anything on your computer, so it's very lightweight. Once you launch the app, it'll automatically connect to one of their servers. You'll also see a pop-up browser window with ads on it. This is one of the ways that they monetize their traffic. But once you close that out, you'll no longer see any ads.
Down below, you can choose a server, and you can choose any one of these servers for free. Now, one thing you might notice when you use Psiphon is the speeds are somewhat limited, and it tends to just crawl along. Over on the left-hand side, they have something called SiCash, and that allows you to unlock faster speeds, and that's another way that they monetize their app. But as long as you're okay with somewhat limited speeds, this is a very good option that you can use entirely for free. At number three, we have one of my favorite free VPN providers. It's ProtonVPN. This is owned by a Switzerland-based company, Proton Technologies AG. You might have heard of them before. It's the same company behind Proton Mail, a very popular end-to-end encrypted email service. On their website, you'll see the free plan alongside several premium paid plans.
Why do they offer a free plan and how do they make money on it? Well, it's like a sales funnel. They're My belief is that some percentage of users who sign up for a free plan will then go on and purchase a premium plan. Once you sign up, over on the left-hand side, you can click on Downloads, and you can download their VPN on pretty much all of the major platforms. Once Once you finish downloading, you'll see an interface that looks like this. Over here, you can choose the server that you want to connect to. Also, you'll see that there's quite a bit of functionality here, but when you click on a lot of it, you'll be reminded that there are premium options available.
Now, out of all of the different free VPN services, this is one of my favorite. They're one of the most generous where you get unlimited data. But once again, you'll be reminded that there are premium features that you could be taking advantage of. At number 4, we have Privato VPN, I guess a play on private. This is another Switzerland-based company. I guess Switzerland just has really solid privacy laws that attracts companies like this. Privato VPN is a relatively young company. They started in 2019, but they have a very nice free offering. On their website, you can click on Get Privato, and here this will show you all the different plans.
Similar to Proton VPN, the hope here is that some number of people who choose the free plan will end up upgrading and go with the premium plans. Once you sign up, you can then download the VPN on any of the major platforms, just like with Proton and some of the other options that we have looked at. Once you launch the app, you can connect to the VPN. Here you can choose what server you want to connect to. For free, you get 12 different servers. Now, all in all, this is a pretty good option. You get 10 gigabytes of data per month.
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