VPN or Virtual Private Network is a safety mechanism that helps protect your data and ensures complete privacy when online. It is particularly for those times when you log on from places like an airport, café, a library, or a hotel. While using this, you do not connect directly to the internet. Rather, you firstly sign up with the VPN provider. If you do this, no agency, hacker, or business firm can find your IP address while you’re surfing the web. The encryption of data is completely ensured by the VPN providers. 

But nothing is completely safe and that is the case with a VPN. The VPN provider would know your IP address and keep a record of all the sites you’ve visited. Be sure that you trust the VPN provider before using their services. Usually, the VPN providers charge for their services. However, some of them don’t. See More, what all you need to know regarding free VPN services.

Things You Need To Know About Free VPN:

VPN

Might slow down internet speed: You might come across slow and poor online connectivity while using the free VPN service. You see more of this in crowded areas. This happens because the free VPN providers do not provide premium services, unlike the paid VPN provider. This is one of their strategies to persuade the users to subscribe to their paid/premium plans.

Risk of a malware infection:

Going by the stats, six out of ten of the VPNs are the ones who do not charge anything for their services. The main source of malware was advertisements. This is due to their reliance on advertisements for money. On the other hand, paid VPNs do not rely on advertisements to earn as they already make money from charges paid by the users.

Hijacking:

Free VPNs are likely to hijack into your browser and unknowingly redirect you to some unsolicited websites. According to a study, there is a case of hijacking when HotSpot Shield redirected its users to sites like eBay and Alibaba.

Might prove ineffective in unblocking certain content:

There are times when the users might want to access some content that might be inaccessible in their regions, but accessible in other parts of the world. For example, if you live in some country and want to see more of the content of say some OTT platform of some other country, you might not be able to access that. But, using a VPN you might be able to access that blocked content. But, here the problem is that the free VPNs often fail to unblock the content. Whereas, if you use a paid one, it is reliable as well as ensures complete unblocking.

They can secretly track you:

Most free VPNs use trackers for many purposes such as tracking, advertisement concerns, etc. It is found in a study that they often use more than one trackers or even third-party trackers.

Might flood you with online ads:

Constant popping up of ads tends to irritate the user as well as slow down the speed of your internet connection. Free VPNs often rely on advertisements to earn profits. There are even reports of a famous free VPN for selling data of the users to a third party.

May allow government interference:

Some of the free VPN companies might be secretly approved by the government to collect the data of the users. See more about it on the government notification issued in this regard.

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