Re: Understanding VPN client options

[George N. White III]

On 3 November 2017 at 15:59, Patrick O'Callaghan <pocallaghan(a)gmail.com&gt;
wrote:

>  On Fri, 2017-11-03 at 10:10 -0700, Rick Stevens wrote: 

>  Using a VPN all depends on how paranoid you are (or rather the
> OP's
>  > father-in-law is). They certainly have their uses.
>
>  They can also be simpler to set up than proxies, for the non-expert
>  user, since they are focused on what the general public wants, or
>  thinks it wants.
>  
Using a VPN may be telling the bad guys you have something worth
hiding.   Bad guys and governments use a variety of information to decide
who merits close watching, so using VPN may bring extra scrutiny of
your activities.  VPN can be circumvented if the endpoints aren't secure.
VPN is certainly important if you know you are in a category that attracts
scrutiny, but many ordinary users may be better off maintaining a low
profile and focusing on basic safe practices like installing security
patches, avoiding insecure public wifi, etc.

-- 
George N. White III <aa056(a)chebucto.ns.ca&gt;
Head of St. Margarets Bay, Nova Scotia