Whenever you travel, you’ve always got a mental checklist of what you need to take – toothbrush, underwear, clothes, phone, charger, wallet, passport, and your favorite book. But did you remember to pack your VPN? Here’s why you should never leave home without it!
VPNs can help international travelers in so many different ways that it’s almost like they were made to travel with you! From security to pure convenience, they can improve your travel experience in ways you never expected.
We rarely leave home every day without a smartphone or a laptop, and the same is true for when we travel. In airports and foreign cities, however, we are cut off from our secure home routers and trusted internet providers.
Public wifi hotspots are notoriously vulnerable, but they’re also going to be one of your primary internet sources abroad. Hackers can set up fake routers that impersonate legitimate ones or simply read unsecured communications using a simple antenna. If you want to manage your finances using a bank app or take care of important matters via email, it’s critical that you secure your connection.
Fortunately, unsecured wifi connections are no match for an encrypted VPN. Not only will it keep unwanted eyes off of what you’re browsing, it’ll also secure communications sent by your apps as well! Browser proxies are not enough – they only cover your browser activity.
When you go abroad, you may be disappointed to discover that your favorite online content or streaming service is no longer available. That’s because many services like to restrict their content exclusively to people in certain parts of the world, and if they travel – tough luck. Even Youtube videos can be blocked depending on your country!
A VPN, however, will let you bypass geo-restriction. Simply set your location to your country of origin to enjoy content as if you were browsing from home! Keep in mind, however, that this may violate your content provider’s terms of service.
One of the airline industry’s dirtiest secrets is that they don’t offer the same prices to the same regions when shopping for flights. There can be many different reasons for this, but it can sometimes come down to the different purchasing power of people in different countries. If you really want to find the very best ticket deals, use a VPN to browse airline ticket vendors from different countries. You just might find a killer deal you’d never thought possible!
Not every country in the world allows access to all of the internet. Some countries stick to banning select websites, while others ban entire social media platforms like Facebook or Twitter. To make sure you can stay connected while you travel in less democratic countries, use a VPN. It will encrypt your traffic and change where you’re browsing, giving you a much better chance to connect to the sites and services you love no matter where you are.
Free VPNs may be enticing, but they’re a bad choice. They are often more of a security liability than just going without since they often make money by selling users’ data. If you get what you pay for, then you don’t get much when using a free VPN!
Instead, go for a premium VPN like NordVPN, which has all of the following features: