Popular Misconceptions About VPNs
Many people use VPNs for their Internet connections, in the attempt to prevent their Internet Service Providers (and others) from seeing what they do while on the Internet.
These VPN services tunnel all of your web traffic (everything you do with your Internet connection, not just data from web browsing) through their servers.
( Of course, VPNs are also used for connecting two remote locations together over the Internet, but that is outside the scope of this post. )
While a VPN service can potentially help to protect your privacy, there are many myths people believe about VPNs.
1 : VPNs will prevent hackers from hacking into my computer
First off, if your computer has an open attack vector facing the Internet, you will eventually get hacked sooner or later.
Secondly, VPNs do not stop malware from infecting your computer (thus allowing a hacker into your computer), nor does it prevent a hacker from learning your real IP address and trying to attack your computer directly.
2 : No malware can get onto my computer while using a VPN
As mentioned above, VPNs do not stop malware from infecting your computer. The VPN service will download that malware-infested file just as happily as your ISP would have.
Your best defense against malware, is a good anti-virus/anti-malware application (e.g., Windows Defender or Malwarebytes), and using common sense when downloading something off the Internet (e.g., does the website you are downloading the file from look sketchy?).
I am aware that some VPN providers provide a feature that blocks malware and ads for you automatically. This is just the VPN provider blacklisting known malware and ad-tracker domains. The VPN itself is not protecting you. It is the blacklists on their DNS servers that are protecting you.
You can provide yourself the same kind of protection by running a Pi-Hole device on your network.
Of course, it is more user-friendly to have a VPN service automatically do this for you, instead of doing it yourself.
3 : VPNs will get past all geo-restricted websites
While VPNs can successfully access geo-restricted web content, some content providers (e.g., Netflix and Steam) disallow VPNs of any kind (according to their Terms of Service). However telling someone that VPNs will always work with geo-restricted websites is just plain false information.
4 : Every “no log” provider really does not log anything
As an IT administrator, I know that not logging anything is pretty much impossible, since logs are necessary to help fix critical problems. While logs can be anonymized, you have no guarantee they are in fact anonymized. It is up to you to decide who to believe when it comes to “no logs”. After all, you are using their network, not your own. Ultimately you are just taking their word for it.
Even if the VPN is telling the truth about not logging (50/50 chance), the VPN’s own ISP most certainly will log all traffic outside of the VPN’s control. So if you are directly connecting to the VPN – with your own residential IP address – your IP is still being logged somewhere.
5 : I can be an outlaw online, since I use a VPN
No VPN will completely protect you if you are doing something to attract the attention of a large, well-connected organization (e.g., a government agency). So if you are thinking about doing something illegal online (via a VPN), you better just forget it. You will get caught sooner or later.
6 : I am completely anonymous to my VPN provider
This one can be semi-true. There are VPN providers that only require an email and can be paid in cryptocurrency (e.g., Bitcoin). However, unless proper steps are taken, your Bitcoin payments can still be tracked.
Also, your VPN provider will know your real IP address, which may help identify who you are.
7 : Anything I send over a VPN is completely secured from prying eyes
A VPN service does not provide point-to-point security. What I mean is that if you access my blog (via HTTPS) through a VPN, your initial connection is encrypted both at the browser and the VPN connection you have established.
However that extra security stops at the VPN itself. Whatever you transmitted to my server gets sent out as if you never used a VPN to begin with after it leaves the VPN’s server.
If you are using a HTTPS enabled website, neither the VPN provider nor anyone else can look at the contents you are transmitting.
On the other hand, if you use a website that has no HTTPS (HTTP-only), then both the VPN service and anyone else (after the data leaves the VPN) can not only snoop your traffic, but they can also modify it. That would not be good for your privacy.
8 : All VPN services have full control over their servers
While it is true that most (if not all) VPN services own their own servers (dedicated or VPS), this does not necessarily mean they have full, complete control over their servers.
Why? Simple. Unless they acquire their own data-center, the VPN company has no real idea of what is happening to their servers. This may not bother you, but it is a potential vector for a security breach of customer information.
9 : With a VPN, you will be anonymous everywhere you go online
There are three problems with this idea.
First, there is no way to be 100% anonymous online. That is a myth.
Secondly, assuming your VPN is not a bad actor itself, the minute you login into a personal account (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Google, Bing, etc.), you will have just identified yourself to the remote computer.
Third, a VPN service cannot stop web tracking methods like tracking cookies and web browser fingerprinting.
Now you may be asking, “How does this allow someone to track my online visits?” Good question. A web browser fingerprint is the identification of someone’s web browser in an attempt to track you regardless of what IP address you are coming from.
Basically your web browser is probed to determine what add-ons you have installed, what fonts are installed on your computer, what video card your computer has (via WebGL), PNG hash, what operating system you are using, your web browser’s 2D canvas, etc. All of this information is combined to form a fingerprint of your web browser.
If you have ever visited a website (without using a VPN) and later on you visit the same website (this time, using a VPN), they can still have a pretty good guess that it is you just by looking at your browser fingerprint you left the last time you visited (without the VPN).
Web browser cookies work in a similar manner. If you do not delete your cookies every time you exit a website, later on when you visit that same website again, they can read the cookie they placed in your web browser and know it is you, even if you are connecting under a different IP address via a VPN service.
Now if the website is say an online retailer, then cookies can be a good thing (your online shopping cart will use cookies, and probably will not work without them enabled). So it depends upon why the particular cookies are used.
web cookies used for good – online shopping cart, logging into your webmail
web cookies used for evil – tracking your visits to spy on you and sell the collected information to 3rd-parties…or worse
10 : “My Internet service gets 100/10 (download / upload) speed, so the VPN service I purchased will give me the same download/upload speed”
This one can sometimes be true, but usually isn’t. You have to understand that there are usually so many customers on any particular VPN server, that the bandwidth is strained between all the users.
If you have 100 people each using 10 Mbps of download bandwidth, there is not going to be much bandwidth left for anyone else to use, if the server does a max of 1000 Mbps.
If you have a 100/10 Internet service, you are doing good if you get 50/8 on a VPN. I am not saying that all VPN servers are slow, but in my experience, most of them are. If you have very fast Internet service, don’t expect to utilize all your bandwidth with a VPN service.
11 : “My VPN service has been audited. It has been verified to not be keeping user logs.”
I have heard of a commercial VPN service being audited to “confirm” no logs are being kept. Unfortunately this means nothing.
You are just having blind-faith in what some audit company says. Unless you have personally inspected each and every section of the VPN service’s network, you really have no clue if they are telling the truth about not keeping logs.
It’s your business whether or not to believe an audit, but I personally consider it unwise.
I hope this post has helped dismantle some myths you may have heard online about VPN services.
So what is the best use for a VPN service?
1) hide your activity from your ISP or untrusted network (does not prevent governments from tracking you down)
2) prevent the remote computer (e.g., web-server) from knowing your real IP address
3) circumvent Geo restrictions (not always reliable and may even be violating the “Terms of Service” of the service you are accessing)
Using a VPN for anything other than those three specific reasons will result in a false sense of security for you. Also, as mentioned before, this all assumes that your VPN provider is a good guy. After all, you are sending your data through their network. Since they have become your “new” ISP, they could sell your data for a pretty penny, and you would be none the wiser.
Please Note: I did not write this post to scare you away from using a VPN provider, but I wanted to make sure people understand that a VPN service is not a “magic pill” that will cure all of your online web privacy problems (as many people seem to think).
Using a VPN for the purpose of preventing your government from spying on you or being 100% anonymous on the web is pointless.
Posted in Computers, Internet and Servers, Security, VPN
What Does the Bible Say about Where We Came From?
Genesis 1 New American Standard Bible (NASB)
1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. 3 Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.
6 Then God said, “Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” 7 God made the expanse, and separated the waters which were below the expanse from the waters which were above the expanse; and it was so. 8 God called the expanse heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day.
9 Then God said, “Let the waters below the heavens be gathered into one place, and let the dry land appear”; and it was so. 10 God called the dry land earth, and the gathering of the waters He called seas; and God saw that it was good. 11 Then God said, “Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees on the earth bearing fruit after their kind with seed in them”; and it was so. 12 The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed after their kind, and trees bearing fruit with seed in them, after their kind; and God saw that it was good. 13 There was evening and there was morning, a third day.
14 Then God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years; 15 and let them be for lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth”; and it was so. 16 God made the two great lights, the greater light to govern the day, and the lesser light to govern the night; He made the stars also. 17 God placed them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, 18 and to govern the day and the night, and to separate the light from the darkness; and God saw that it was good. 19 There was evening and there was morning, a fourth day.
20 Then God said, “Let the waters teem with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth in the open expanse of the heavens.” 21 God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarmed after their kind, and every winged bird after its kind; and God saw that it was good. 22 God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” 23 There was evening and there was morning, a fifth day.
24 Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures after their kind: cattle and creeping things and beasts of the earth after their kind”; and it was so. 25 God made the beasts of the earth after their kind, and the cattle after their kind, and everything that creeps on the ground after its kind; and God saw that it was good.
26 Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28 God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” 29 Then God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree which has fruit yielding seed; it shall be food for you; 30 and to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the sky and to every thing that moves on the earth which has life, I have given every green plant for food”; and it was so. 31 God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
Posted in Biblical Accounts, Christian