Virtual Private Network (VPN)

Context:

Recently, The Government of India has issued notices to virtual private network (VPN) service providers to adhere to the rues released by Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In).

Virtual Private Network, as the name suggests is an intermediary which connects the user to the destination web page.
It acts as a secure channel and protects the privacy of the user.
So the when the user is accessing the web through VPN, the IP address of the user cannot be detected hence it will be difficult to track the location of the user.

One of the major advantage of a VPN is privacy, without a vpn connection the websites can accurately track the user.
A VPN connection will protect the user from cyber criminals as it delinks the user’s activity from the IP address.
The VPN provides for a provision of location spoofing, it allows the user to get through the geo restrictions.
To take a simple example, certain films or other content may not be available in your region — Netflix, for instance, knows every time you connect from your home region, and which movie should not be on the menu.
It also protects the users from online censorship, for example a website may be banned from using in a particular country, then a VPN user can bypass this restriction.

Using a VPN, a lot of cybercrimes including identity theft, online fraud, cyberbullying, stalking, etc. can be done and it would be difficult to identify the culprit.
Since VPNs require your traffic to be routed via a VPN server, it could take longer to reach your destination website.
One major problem for VPN users is that they are often denied access to certain websites and services.

Source The Hindu