So I’m doing a remodel and building in a IT closet. It darned on me that instead of paying for a VPN service I think I can create my own. Is that right? I’d it simple enough through raspberry pi or some other service? I have a syno. Can i build it in though that? I’d rather pay for safety and security but if I can replicate I’d like to keep that in mind. Thanks.
The question is, what are you wanting to accomplish? Are you wanting to be anonymous? Hide your bittorrent use? Protect your laptop/phone when using public wifi while away from home? The first 2 would need a 3rd party, like Nord. The last one can be accomplish with a Raspberry Pi running Wiregruard.
You’re talking about 2 different use cases. A VPN service like Nord is for anonymizing and/or spoofing your location and public IP while a home VPN server is for gaining secure access to resources on your home network. Granted, using the personal VPN while away from home can also protect you while using public WiFi.
What benefits are you looking to take advantage of?
VPN at home is useful if your ISP doesn’t CG-NAT you (or similar). If you get a public, routable IP (or better yet, a block of IP’s) then you can utilize your connection at home for accessing a VPN say from your phone when out and about. This can also give you access to your local network.
I do this as I use business grade services. Have blocks of both IPv4 and IPv6, so can give my mobile phones better access when on the cell network. It also gives them IPv6.
You can also do similar buying a Virtual Private Server (cloud servers). These you run your own Linux or the like on a shared server at a data center with high bandwidth. Can use this as above, or route all of your internet via it and gain advantages of hidden ISP and L3 dDoS protection.
Third party VPNs are great for getting Cease And Desist letters sent to someone else’s trash can while you do something illegal with impunity.
That’s about it. There’s no added security. There’s no added safety. Your regulated ISP’s ability to inspect your traffic is traded for an unregulated third party’s ability to inspect your traffic. Your latency to anything and everything goes up.
A third party VPN is like paying some Chinese warehouse to let you have all your packages shipped to them and forwarded to you because you don’t trust UPS/FedEx.
I use Nord for anonymity, and also a Wireguard (via PiVPN) when I just want to use public wifi or access content/services that are on my home network.
Where do you want your traffic to appear from? Do you want to capture everything or spilt things up? Geo-blocked streaming services won’t like your endpoint being in Malta or Bulgaria, and you may not even be able to log in to your bank, or government services.
If you split your traffic at the router you could direct different things across the net through your ISP and other traffic through VPN, but that’s pretty laborious work building the routing/firewall rules.
You can get yourself a micro VPS with 100GB traffic for a quarter a week and set it up as a VPN server and your router is the client. Just remember your VPS traffic will be 2x whatever is hitting your home router as it has to go in an out.
You’d need to set up a server at your endpoint location. Adding a pi to your home network will only give you a tunnel back to your house.
Aha. Ok then yes I’ll need Nord bc I want to remain anonymous
Looks like I’m interested in having both. I like the idea of protecting my home network.
But wouldn’t my ISP also be providing this protection?
But wouldn’t my ISP also be providing this protection?
Lol.
Protecting it from what? Have a good router with no services enabled on it and keep your pc’s clean. A VPN doesn’t prevent your computer from getting hit with malware.
You want your home network to be “more secure” then be very aware of what you are clicking on and how your browser is set up.
Haha no? OK. I mean I don’t know anything, so pardon my ignorance. So there is really no security is someone wanted to target my home, unless I set it up myself?
You will have to provide the level of security you’re comfortable with. Never count on your ISP to provide anything but an open door into your network.
Your router provides the elementary security for your network.
Your third party VPN provides zero security.