If you’re reading this article, chances are you are accurately aware about the vital importance of using VPNs to browse, play or conduct business online. Maybe, unfortunately, you were a victim of a cyberattack. Unfortunately, cyberthieves continue to cause trillions in online damages as well as permanently ruining business reputations. Traditionally VPNs have been the primary clog in cybersecurity defenses and at the same time maintaining anonymity. But as technology continues to improve, so do the viable VPN alternatives.
The Function of VPNs
The primary role of a VPN is to protect your online privacy. The primary way VPNs do this is by masking your actual IP address by routing it through a series of global routers and servers. These specialized servers use special encryption measures to mask the origins of your IP address, while at the same time, encrypting and protecting your personal information.
Besides maintaining online anonymity, VPNs help to maintain, or in some cases, increase bandwidth. One of the constant problems online users having streaming movies or playing at online casinos is consistent bandwidth. Most VPNs are sophisticated enough to prevent throttling, which is a sudden reduction in bandwidth, to keep you in the game. VPNs are often used to work around geo restrictions.
VPN Alternatives that Protect Your Privacy and More
While VPNs provide many benefits, it is by no means a perfect technology. Fortunately as the internet continues to improve so do new means to help fight cybercriminals. If you’re looking for viable VPN alternatives, give these options a shot:
Secure Access Service Edge
SASE is a highly sophisticated network framework technology that hit the scene in 2019. The best way to understand the SASE framework is the concept of condensing and combining critical technologies like firewalls and other wide network functions under one component. The immediate results is managing these essentials more efficiently. Also, by having all the components in one area, it prevents the ways that hackers can crack your network and take down your information.
SASE is highly popular among businesses and Enterprise companies because it imposes stricter controls like zero-trust features which works well with remote employees who need secure access to the networks.
Proxy Servers
Proxy servers are dedicated computers that have their own particular IP address. A better way to understand proxy servers is that they work in the middle of the online consumer interacting with a website, and the website itself that is distributing information to the online user. With all the data and traffic going through the server, it essentially serves as a sacrificial lamb to protect the main computer and its network to thwart hackers.
It also prevents hackers getting a jump on discovering your true IP address to do a reverse proxy. However, unlike VPNs, proxy servers don’t encrypt information. This still opens the door for hackers to observe your online behavior.
Proxy servers also make it easy to enforce and maintain online security and access such as preventing the wrong users or members from accessing different parts of the website. Another huge benefit for using proxy servers is caching pages. Caching is a great way to increase page speeds. Most search engines rank websites based on page speed. If it is under three seconds, it will rank higher.
SSH Tunnels
For a more direct and secure connection between the requested website’s server and the computer seeking the information, ssh tunnels is a popular way to go. SSH is short secure shell which is literally a digital tunnel to securely pass information. SSH technology is a popular way for users to interact with remote computers, or from remote locations and devices like a mobile browser using a WI-FI connection. When using ssh tunnels, its common to specific specific ports to transmit information. In tandem with firewalls, ssh tunnels provide high levels of online security.
SD-Wan
A software-defined wan is a specialized cloud service that offers many of the vital VPN features and at incredible speed. High level businesses often use SD-Wans to encrypt information at high speeds as it travels through its network system. Also, SD-Wans can repeat this process over several locations and networks with tremendous success.
