VPNs - What, Why, and When?
IT is full of abbreviations. Too many if you ask me. It's quite possible to have an entire IT conversation using 75% abbreviations and it make perfectly good sense.
And VPN is an abbreviation that's come to light for many "non-IT" people in the past 5+ years. So what is it? Why would you need one and when would you use it?
WHAT
Nerdy one liner. A VPN is a program that allows your computer to connect to another network and access its resources.
Ok, let me explain it to you like this. Imagine you're at home. Your kid is playing Call of Duty with his friends using language that would make you rich if you got paid every time he swore. His gaming PC is connected to your home modem using a network cable. This network cable allows his PC to use your home internet to disrespect others at an alarming rate, and without this cable, the PC connects to nothing. With me so far?
Now, you're starting to get jacked because you can hear the retorts of your son's opps ("opponents" if you're not into current day rap music, which is pretty poor mind you, 90's all the way baby!) and can clearly hear "your mum" intertwined amongst creative unmentionables. So you decide to hoof it to a friend's place, and you've brought your laptop to connect to their Wi-Fi because... I dunno where I was going with this, but I've gotten too far into this narrative now to start again, so just friggen connect your laptop to their wi-fi ok!
So now you've connected your laptop to your friend's internet, and you decide to buy movie tickets for your son to get him out of the house. You buy them and you want to print them, but your friend's a bit of a cheap a$$ and hasn't replaced the toner in her printer. So you fire up your VPN program and connect to your home network. You send those tickets printing to your home printer (thankfully, you're not as much of a cheap a$$ as your friend, but still cheap a$$ enough to buy non genuine toner), call your son, tell him to get the tickets out of the printer and GTFO of the house now, before you get home.
An imaginary network cable from your laptop to your house. That's what a VPN is!
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WHY
Ok from a business POV, you would use a VPN to connect to work files, programs and all that other stuff that really should have been moved to the cloud years ago, but the company doesn't want to spend money on IT, because it's not high on the priority list, but if it were ever to NOT work, it's the most important thing in the business (rant over)!
Personally, you would use a VPN to essentially "hide your tracks" or appear as if you're in another country. You would do this back in the day to watch Netflix stuff from other countries. I don't know how relevant this is now, cause I think I see more foreign stuff on Netflix Australia than ever before.
Hiding your tracks? Well, if you know what I'm talking about then it goes without saying, but, if you don't know what I'm talking about, then let's just leave it at that. I don't want to promote such behaviour, but on the DL if anyone has any good links, please...... (jokes). VPN's not only hide your whereabouts, but it also encrypts the info you send and receive too. Further hiding your tracks.
WHEN
When would you use a VPN?
I think that covers VPNs for now. If you're using one and you're not in IT, need it for work, want to access overseas stuff or are extra paranoid about security, you may need to take a look in the mirror...... :P
dEx
Co-Founder Laptop Adapter&Power Supply at Kingta(HK)/Godmobi Tech(China)
9 个月especially IMPORTANT in China users!