In this age of information, when you sign up for anything on the internet, you are basically exposing yourself to the entire world. Many websites will promise you the security of data, and in a lot of cases, we sign up for the ones that don’t. You every move on the internet is being tracked to be used mostly for advertisement and sometimes even for hacking. The data of our web activity is precious, and that is exactly what companies like Facebook and Google are thriving on.
It may not have been the biggest life issue a while back, but the Federal Trade Commission recently allowed the providers to sell user’s information. In some cases, you can opt out of this if mentioned in the license agreement, but realistically speaking, who reads the license agreement ever?
Virtual Private Networks or VPNs have been around for a long time, but they have become more important ever since the approval of data selling. You can use the simple software tool to create an encrypted and secure network connection with the server to protect your privacy on the internet and click anywhere without the fear of being tracked. This resource will help you on how to use a VPN
Only three people have access to our internet activity; one is the service provider, the government and the other is the hackers who have access to public networks. All that a VPN does is scrambling our request before it reaches them. Thus, the people can not comprehend what we are doing despite having access to our activity. By scrambling, we mean turning the script into gibberish that can not be decoded, thus adding a layer of security to our browsers.
Most VPN serve the basic purpose of blocking all third party trackers, but there are some like “Disconnect” that even inform you of all the tracking requests you receive including social media, advertising, content, or analytics. It is important to know because it is not always beneficial to block tracking.
The question is, how can you tell if it is useful to be tracked or harmful? For most companies, tracking serves two major purposes, either to maintain their demographic data or to make your web experience better. The latter is beneficial to you in most cases and company would have it stated in their terms of use.
The Disconnect app is compatible with iOS, Android, Windows and Mac OS X making you safe online while letting you know what things you are missing out on. It increases the browsing speed by blocking the trackers and malware that put a strain on your device. Once these tracking requests are blocked, your web experience is naturally enhanced with better speed.
Another advantage to having a VPN is that you can get access to the content that is otherwise locked in your area because your location tag won’t be a problem at all. Here is a list of the best VPNs picked by Tech Radar that you can choose from and go on browsing the internet safely.
