Are VPNs legal? The answer is, it depends.

VPNs are becoming more and more popular: we see them being advertised on many YouTube channels, they are also frequently recommended on tech sites, and if you try to watch a video that is banned in your country, a friend must have told you that you can watch this video if you connect to a VPN .

VPNs were originally designed so that a user can connect to a remote network regardless of their actual physical location. It’s a kind of connection It is widely used in corporate environment For years, workers away from the office could connect to the company’s network and resources without having to travel to their on-site workstation.

However, VPNs today are in a wider range. Many people use it to browse the internet privately thus preventing your ISP (Internet Service Provider) from tracking the pages you visit, and it is also very common to access blocked content on the regional internet.

How do VPNs work?

VPN technology (Virtual Private Network or a virtual private network) that allows us to establish a secure connection between our devices and a remote server. This is for practical purposes allows us to surf the Internet As if we were in the same actual location From that server, as we discussed a moment ago.

As a result, the IP address of our device will also be replaced by A new IP address from the same country Where is the server located. For example, if we connect to a VPN server located in Germany, our device will get a German IP and we will be able to browse as if we were physically in that country.

In this way, what we do is anonymize or anonymize any information that identifies us, such as our IP address, location or internet browsing data. In the eyes of any outside observer, the only thing they will see is that we are associated with a proxy serverbut there the path will be lost, as our online activity cannot be traced beyond this point.

Are VPNs legal?

Currently VPNs They are illegal only in China, Turkey, Iraq, Russia, Belarus, North Korea, and Turkmenistan. In other countries like United Arab Emirates, Uganda and Iran Only some VPNs pre-approved by local authorities can be used in Sultanate of Oman Personal use is prohibited, although some organizations or government services are allowed to use VPN connections.

In the rest of the countries, VPNs are legal It can be used completely legally. In Spain, as well as in the rest of Europe, its use is permitted, as in the United States and other places such as Latin America (except for Venezuelawhich is not illegal but it looks like the government will ban some VPNs), as there are no regulatory restrictions on this type of tool yet.

Be warned, this is not an absolute mandate to do what we want, because if we do something illegal (pirated multimedia content, for example) it will still be a crime whether we are connected to a VPN or not.

Can I use a VPN to watch region locked content?

If you live or reside in a country where the use of this technology is legal, you can use the features of VPNs without restrictions of any kind. Including the ability to display closed-zone content.

For example, due to broadcasting rights, the Netflix catalog is different in every country, so many series or movies are only available in certain regions of the planet. If you have gone on vacation outside of Spain and would like to continue watching your favorite Netflix series, you can connect to a VPN to access your account and continue enjoying your subscription.

Another thing is that you want to see the entire Netflix catalog without leaving your home, in which case you have to remember that Netflix USA, the region with the largest content on the platform, is increasingly interested in this type of connection, and more than likely it will detect that we have a VPN and block our arrival.

For some time now, Netflix has been trying to prevent these violations more actively, with more effective detection methods and constantly blocking VPN server IP addresses. Although many VPN services do not want to openly admit this, in practice it is becoming increasingly difficult every day to watch streaming content with a connection of this type, a trend that does not appear to change in the short term. A very important thing to consider.

Anyway, when you want to rent a VPN service, make sure they have proxy servers in the countries you want to connect to, and don’t forget to check their “No Logs” policy to prevent data like data from leaking. Your username and password for Netflix, YouTube, or any other online service.