By hiding the IP , one can hide hacks, websites and many more

The internet could be better than it is today: more open, private, and secure. Smart engineers, system administrators, and designers have been spending several years for developing a security and privacy tool to bring this vision closer to reality. Today, millions of users around the world click the blue Quick Connect button whenever they need online protection. That’s a very private club.

By using a VPN - However, you need to understand that using a VPN isn’t the be-all and the end-all of internet security/privacy. The other two options are TOR (The browser) and using a proxy. Both of these options are inferior to using a VPN, but they do have their strengths and weaknesses.

So, what is a VPN? You may ask. Well, first of all, it stands for Virtual Private Network, and it’s one of the tools most mentioned in the context of modern privacy on the web. While there are many uses for VPNs, there are a growing number of providers who advertise privacy preserving VPNs. For example, NordVPN’s website advertises, “Enjoy secure and private access to the Internet with NordVPN, encrypt your online activity to protect your private data from hackers or snoopy advertisers.”

How exactly does a VPN protect you?

When you use a virtual private network, in essence, you are using a proxy to make requests on your behalf. With a “privacy-focused” VPN, your connection to the proxy is encrypted which makes it impossible for someone snooping on your traffic to determine what kind of messages you’re exchanging with the VPN server. Typically, the VPN server’s role is to make web requests on your behalf, instead of having you make them directly.

In Box: Some ISPs don’t spy on their consumers and they respect their privacy. It’s rare, but it CAN happen. You can check whether or not you’re being tracked by finding out if you have a transparent proxy attached to your IP.

Let’s say I want to visit a *dirty* website, but I don’t want my ISP to know that I’m visiting that website; it’s a dirty secret after all. Normally, I have to make a request via my ISP that says, “I’m visiting xxx.” or at least the IP address for that website. My ISP can easily log this information and, for example, sell it to advertisers later, which is more common than you may think. It’s practically the norm, rather than the exception.

A VPN allows you to send an encrypted message to the VPN provider that says, “can you fetch the website data for xxx, and send it to me please?” Your ISP knows that you sent a message to your VPN, but because of the encryption they cannot read the content of your message. The VPN’s ISP could see that the VPN made a request for xxx, but couldn’t necessarily correlate the VPN’s request for that website, with your request to the VPN.

Using the TOR browser in combination with a secure, trustworthy VPN more than ensures that your private internet exploring will, indeed be, P R I V A T E. It’s what I use, at the very least.