For an index to all my stories click this text.
This story explains how to install a VPN on Kubuntu
This does not work on a Raspberry Pi. For the Pi there is a different solution which will be addressed in an upcoming story.
What is a VPN
For those that have no idea what a VPN is and why you could use one I'll give a brief explanation.
First the name. VPN stands for Virtual Private Network.
Normally when you visit a website with your browser you have a direct connection to that website.
A VPN is a bridge in between. So you send the request for the website to the server of the VPN provider. The connection between your browser and the VPN server is encrypted and their server is a secure server. The VPN then contacts the website, gets the information and sends it encrypted back to you.
That way you do not have direct contact with the website you want to look at. This keeps you safe in countries where free speech is at stake. But it also makes it impossible for the website you are visiting to track you down. Even your Internet Provider can not see what sites you are visiting.
Another advantage is that you can access sites that are geo-restricted. This means that the website you are contacting even does not know in which country you are.
For a long time this was popular by people in Europe that wanted to watch certain US TV-shows. Without a VPN the US media server saw that you were in Europe and prohibited viewing. If you contacted these media through a VPN server they could not see that you were not in the US.
A VPN is secure for both UDP and TCP communication. Therefore you can also mask your IOT communication this way.
But it's not only safe for anonymously browsing. For Internet banking and mailing a VPN is also an extra safety step.
Free or paid VPN's
There are free and paid VPN services.
The restriction of a free VPN service is that you have less VPN servers to chose from, the service might not always be available and it may be slower.
I have been using the free VPN services from Proton for a while and they were always available and I did not notice any significant speed limitations. I do see that the amount of free VPN servers is indeed more limited as with their paid service, but for my testing purposes that did not bother me.
Proton have a no-log policy. That means that they do not keep a log of your activities. That is an extra safety measure that makes sure that no one can see what sites or services you have been using.
Even the Dutch consumer organisation "Consumentenbond" stated that the free Proton VPN service had little restrictions.
https://www.consumentenbond.nl/veilig-internetten/veiliger-internetten-met-een-vpn
Proton
Proton is a company that was founded by crowdsourcing and their main shareholder is the non-profit Proton Foundation. Their first priority ia privacy for internet users. One of the members of the organisation is Tim Berners Lee who is the inventor of the internet. Many of the people that work at Proton originate from CERN the European Organisation for Nuclear reasearch. Which is also the place where the internet was born.
This all sounds trustfull which is a must for a privacy first oriented company and VPN service.
Next to the VPN service they also supply a safe email service, a cloud based storage (drive), bitcoin wallet etc. etc. etc. Indeed all kinds of products where privacy is of the utmost concern.
Install Proton VPN
To use a VPN you'll need to install a small software package. This package intercepts all your network communication and sends it to the VPN server.
Installing the VPN software in Kubuntu is easy. Just visit the Proton website and follow the steps by pressing the button "Get Proton VPN"
https://protonvpn.com/
Fill in your email address and make up a password. Then download the software.
Using the Proton VPN
After downloading and installing Proton VPN you will find the software in the internet section of the Application Launcher.
The first time using Proton VPN you need to log in with your freshly created email address and password.
The software mentions that you are disconnected, meaning that you are not connected to a VPN server. You can choose the option "Quick Connect" at the top of the window in which case Proton chooses a radom server for you.
You can also click on one of the Cobbect buttons next to a mentioned country in the list. That way Proton VPN choses a connection to a free server in that country.
Clicking on the down arrow next to the country of your choosing presents a list of VPN servers in that country.
As you can see there are 2 free to use servers in Romania. There are 13 more servers in Romania but they are for paying members.
Next to the server you can see a percentage. In this example both servers show 87%. That means that the server still has some room for making new connections. If the percentage is at 100% the server is at his maximum capacity and it will not allow you to connect.
After choosing the server of your liking you can see that the connection is established.
That is all.
You can now open your browser and visit any website you want without anybody being able to trace your internet tracks.
Does it work.
We here is a quick and simple test to see if the VPN works.
Start with disconnecting the VPN server in the Proton VPN software by simply pressing the Disconnect button.
Then open your internet browser and visit the following site:
https://www.whatsmyip.org/
The website shows your normal IP address.
Now activate the Proton VPN server and choose any server anywhere in the world to your liking. Then again visit https://www.whatsmyip.org/
And look at that: a totally different IP address.
Extra safety
Those of you who have used a TOR browser know that a TOR browser connects to a TOR server, that connects to another TOR server and that again connects to yet another TOR server. And that last server connects to the website you wanted to have a look at.
This way you can not easily be traced.
For extra safety you can use your TOR browser with the VPN.
Just make sure to start the VPN connection first and then start your TOR browser. That way your TOR browser connects to a TOR server through your VPN connection which gives you an encrypted communication line upon an encrypted line. So a double encrypted and untraceable connection.
So if you, for example, want to see a tv show or series that is only available for US citizens within the US connect to a VPN server in the US. And if you connect through a TOR browser make sure the last server in the range is also a US TOR server.
Just be aware that a TOR browser slows your connection to the end station down.
Safe surfing
till next time
have fun
Luc Volders
