The issue of online security and privacy has become a popular topic these days. This is because users can leave digital footprints on every online site that they visit. During your journey through the internet, you might not even notice that someone is watching you. As a regular online user, you should prioritize ensuring your privacy and safety through advanced tools such as virtual private networks (VPNs).
What Is A VPN? Why Should You Start Using One?
Any internet user should possess a reliable virtual private network (VPN) to secure their personal information online. A VPN, basically, is a network service that keeps your internet browsing protected and confidential over unprotected public Wi-Fi hotspots, as well as your personal internet connection.
The first thing you need to check when looking for a good VPN service is its reliability. There are a lot of VPN providers out there, and it would be helpful to read reviews from sites like https://invpn.com/ to weigh which VPN provider will be suitable for your security and privacy needs. Many excellent VPN services have paid plans but they typically offer a free trial period.
Essentially, investing your time and money for a VPN service is noteworthy, particularly if you’re a consistent web user who navigates the internet for different purposes. While VPN is more acknowledged as a security tool for browsing websites, sending emails and documents, or using social media platforms, it doesn’t receive much light in terms of gaming. From light smartphone games like Candy Crush to PC games, using a VPN can make a huge difference in your gaming experience.
What You Need To Know Before Using VPN For Gaming
Same as VPNs used for other tasks, utilizing VPN in gaming makes use of encrypted connection through a server that will connect to your chosen game. By using a VPN server, your internet service provider (ISP) can only see how much data you’ve consumed, but not exactly how the data has been consumed by your online activities.
Keep in mind that a VPN can only protect your privacy and security from general government surveillance. But why should you still use a VPN for gaming?
Advantages of Using A VPN For Gaming
Since gaming features a different purpose than browsing, streaming, or uploading, there are additional advantages that you can enjoy from integrating a VPN into your gaming. Aside from general security and privacy, which VPNs are well known for, here are five advantages of using a VPN for your gaming activities:
Avoids Data Throttling
Due to one reason or another, everyone who uses the internet for data-consuming tasks
has experienced bandwidth throttling. It is when your ISP limits your data consumption at any given time. The purpose of data throttling is to reduce congestion on your network at one moment or throttles you for a while to measure your data rate in a specific platform. Since most online games devour chunks of data consistently, you’ll inevitably encounter bandwidth throttling.
Thankfully, using a VPN can solve this problem. While your data consumption varies according to the game type, requirements, and the number of hours you’ve played, a VPN encrypts your data so your ISP wouldn’t be able to identify if you’re doing a low or high traffic activity.
Bypasses Geoblocking
Unfortunately, gamers from certain regions are restricted from playing games on other servers. For instance, if you’re located in the US, then you should only join the US server, and you can’t enter other region servers if you want to play with your online friends. How do these online games identify your designated server? They’re able to do this using a geoblocking technology which basically blocks you from attempting to join a server that doesn’t match your region.
By using a VPN during your gaming sessions, you can bypass this geoblocking system and connect to servers from other regions. Since a VPN hides your real IP address and creates a new IP address designated for that region, the game won’t recognize that you’re from another place.
If a new game or game version isn’t released yet around the world, and only in some countries, you can have early access to the game using a VPN.
Makes You Safe From DDoS Attacks
It’s important to understand that the gaming world isn’t safe. The gaming industry is still one of the most vulnerable industries in terms of cyber-attacks, and hackers don’t just attack a gaming company as a whole, but also harm individual gamers. While playing a game, you can be susceptible to a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack. This type of attack floods compromised systems with a flood of requests to distract you from playing, eventually forcing you offline.
You can safeguard yourself from DDoS attacks because people attempting to attack you with a DDoS won’t be able to find your connection since it’s been encrypted by your VPN.
Enhances Safety On Public Wi-Fi
Being the most prominent importance of VPNs, public gaming can increase your safety risks than playing at home. If you’re currently connected to a public WiFi network in your school, mall, or any establishment, turning on your VPN is paramount to protect you from any online threat. Public Wi-Fis don’t use encrypted networks, so anyone can see
the data transmitted between your device and the public Wi-Fi router.
Here are top online threats that can harm you in a public internet setting:
- Man-in-the-middle attacks
- Wi-Fi sniffing and snooping
- Malware
Lessens Notorious Lagging
Along with bandwidth throttling, it’s frustrating to experience lagging while in an exciting battle or mission. Lagging typically happens when your data takes too long to be received by the game server, and vice versa, known as long ping times. Undeniably, lagging ruins your gaming sessions, and worse, cause you to lose your rank or level.
To reduce your lagging and long ping periods, a VPN can streamline the path of your connection, so that your data has a faster and more direct route to the game server. However, take note that you shouldn’t connect to a congested game server or a server that’s too far away, as it can reverse the advantage and make your gaming much slower.
Takeaways
Indeed, online gaming is all fun until you realize that your safety and privacy are compromised, or your connection has worsened. To make your gaming experience as smooth-sailing as possible, try to install and activate a VPN on your device. There are a lot of advantages that you can enjoy, especially from an excellent VPN provider with features particular for gaming.