From the course: Help Yourself: Tech Tips Weekly

Connecting to a VPN

From the course: Help Yourself: Tech Tips Weekly

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Connecting to a VPN

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- [Instructor] VPN stands for Virtual Private Network. It offers a secure way to connect to a local network to share resources or to access the internet anonymously. Your organization may offer a VPN to provide access to private network resources from another location. For example, you use your laptop to access the internet. Then use the VPN software to log into your organization's network to work remotely. The VPN provides access to services, just as if you were using your computer in the organization. Another type of VPN is used to surf the web anonymously. In this mode, your internet connection is made through a VPN service. As you browse the web, it's the VPN's identification that appears, not your own. Both of these technologies are similar, though the organizational VPN is something your organization will help you set up. The other type of VPN can be used by anyone to browse the internet anonymously. Anonymous internet VPN software is available on the internet. I recommend avoiding the free services. Instead get a subscription service. The cost is nominal for a yearly subscription. On this PC, I've installed the VPN software for private internet access. To run the app, I choose the notification icon on the task bar, and then I see this window. Click the big power button, and now the internet believes that I'm using a computer in Vancouver, Canada, instead of my true location. Advertising trackers and websites that attempt together my location information are now thwarted by the VPN. This anonymous connection is different from the VPN you may use to access an organization's internal servers. That type of connection requires special software provided by your organization. But both methods use the same VPN protocols, and both offer a layer of security unavailable on the raw internet.

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