My roommate works in it security, with a masters in it security. I thought he would be using a vpn, but I just discovered that he would never use one, on the reason of “why would i need to send my information through someone else”?
I’m a bit confused. Thoughts?
VPN provider could log all your activities.
VPN provider could give logs to government if necessary and if you live in five eyes countries.
You might still have unique fingerprint no matter what your IP address is.
For most organization/company, VPN is one great package to get all information abut you if VPN provider logs and hand it over to them secretly
Many VPN provider does not allow you to have custom DNS. So many people give up using it in favour of custom DNS like nextDNS.
Sounds like your roommate doesn’t fully understand VPN’s. It’s important to distinguish between VPN as a type of technology and VPN providers/companies.
Because modern encryption protocols are a powerful security resource, VPN technologies can be powerful tools as well. Keep in mind that you can always setup your own VPN server.
What about VPN providers/companies? They’re VPN providers that I do not trust. And there’s VPN providers that I trust greatly. This is why it’s important to throughly research these companies before deciding to use their networks.
Your ISP knows TONS of data about you: your real name, home address, probably phone number and email, home IP address, maybe even sees your phone and TV traffic (if you get those services through the ISP).
In contrast, it’s easy to sign up to a VPN with fake ID, they don’t care as long as your payment works. They’re used to customers who want to hide their ID.
So then all the VPN would know is “guy at home IP address N is doing encrypted traffic to domains A, B, C”.
Far better to hide some info from your ISP, which already knows FAR too much about you. Compartmentalize.
VPN also can give other features: change geo-location, may do ad-blocking. As well as hiding your home IP address from web sites.
I don’t trust either ISP or VPN. So I use HTTPS, and I split my data between the two companies (compartmentalization). ISP knows my home address, real name, phone number, IP address. VPN sees what domains my IP address accesses. Neither company knows all of it.
you trust a random VPN provider that you pay for and that claims privacy than your network operator. A random VPN corporation is less likely to care what you do on line than your parents or your roommate or the guest network at work.
No need to trust your VPN. Make it so all they know is that “IP address N is accessing domains A, B, C”. You do this by using HTTPS, and by not giving real name or home address etc to VPN when you sign up. All they really care is that your payment works.
Everything you just said is true of many ISPs, too. So same situation if you don’t use VPN.
I don’t trust either ISP or VPN, so I split my data between them, and use HTTPS so neither can see inside my traffic. ISP knows my home address, name, IP address. VPN knows my IP address, and what domains I access. Neither one knows all of it.