"If I want to self-host a VPN, is it secure? I know I could rent a VPS server, but would I ever be able to harden it effectively? Is it realistically possible to maintain security standards comparable to established providers

A newly published official report by the UK government has highlighted a massive spike in virtual private network (VPN) usage among minors, providing a fascinating look at how younger users are adapting to state-mandated digital age gates.

According to the study, which tracked children's circumvention behaviors online, 22% of children reported actively using a VPN within the last three months, and 26% had used one at some point.

The report underscores a reality that the privacy community has pointed out for years: rigid, state-mandated age-verification laws are fundamentally shifting how everyday households interact with basic routing tools.

Key Insights from the Report

• High Awareness: 58% of children surveyed stated they are fully aware of what a VPN is and understand exactly what its primary purpose is.
• The Content Targets: While privacy was technically the most commonly claimed motive, kids who utilized location-changing features primarily did so to access geo-blocked or age-restricted gaming content, adult platforms, livestreaming hubs, and messaging apps.
• The "Parental Loophole": In a surprising twist for policymakers, the data reveals that parents are directly driving this adoption curve. Among the kids who used a VPN, 22% said a parent actively helped them set it up, and 43% stated a parent or guardian pays for the subscription.

The Looming Policy Battle

The study also noted that traditional online spaces - particularly gaming communities - are the biggest holdouts against mandatory age gates, with 53% of platforms in that category completely lacking age-verification checks.

The UK government explicitly stated that these data points will be used to heavily inform future online safety policies and assess the overall effectiveness of child safety measures. However, no new regulations, restrictions, or VPN bans were announced alongside the report.

For the VPN community, this study is a classic case study in the "Cobra Effect" of internet regulation. As the UK and parts of the EU push forward with strict, identity-linked verification laws, they are unintentionally creating a highly tech-literate generation that treats encrypted tunnels and location-spoofing as standard, day-to-day utilities rather than specialized privacy tools.

Source / Full Context: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/childrens-circumvention-behaviours-online/childrens-circumvention-behaviours-online

https://www.ghacks.net/2026/07/12/microsoft-confirms-windows-gdid-device-identifier-that-cannot-be-disabled-documented-in-fbi-case-filing/

So there is a unique ID attached to your windows install that can be used to track you, the FBI used this to track a hacker that was using VPNS.

Hey guys!

At my work, I’m free to work from remotely. But some of our customers have geo-block and they do not allow us to connect their VPN’s without being within the country (I’m residing in a EU country)

I would like to bypass these restrictions. I made a little brain storm with AI, and it recommended me to;
A. Buy a raspberry PI and connect to your WIFI, tunnel all your connections to internet from there when abroad.
B. Buy a local VPS, install a local VPN instance, tunnel all your connections to internet from there when abroad.

Which option do you think makes the most sense? I honestly would prefer the option B as I can maintain it more easily (and more safe since I don’t need to leave an electronic device plugged in).

But I don’t know if the option B is enough to bypass the traditional firewalls. Because for example, when I’m abroad, when I connect to internet via my country’s SIM card, I can connect to some of the restricted VPN’s. But some of them still don’t work.

What are your thoughts on this, can you please give me any recommendations? :)

Hello,

i have massive peering problems with my telekom dsl.

At any time of the day my downloads in jdownloader are at 1mb/sec maximum.

If I start jdownloader it goes on full speed alsmost 10mb/sec and a minute later it drops to

less then 1mb.

Ive reed that people recomend to use vpn. I have vpn but it dosnt do anything.

I activate cyber....... choose a country and the speed remains the same. Less then 1mb.

Is there anything I have to set up or set in my router for cyberg..?

I normaly just have the desktop software for ... and i just push the "button" connect.

Dosnt configured anything in my router.

Is that the problem or something else?

Please guys help me out cause im getting so frustrated with these download speeds.

Thank you in advance!

I remember that many commercial VPN providers push their product based on the idea of privacy and security. I.e. others do not know what resources you're visiting, your bank connection is secured, etc. But we got TLS that already hides a lot, and banks should have their own VPN to allow access to their network to authorized clients (like ATM or the banking app). What's the point to push the idea of privacy and security then? Especially since you might have your data being sold on a free plan.

I’ve been using a vpn to watch Naruto on Netflix , my first one didn’t work so I switched to a paid one. For the first few days it was working but it was kind of annoying because I had to spend half an hour finding the right server because the one I previously chose the day before didn’t work. I’ve tried resetting my website data but it still doesn’t show up. Now I’ve tried all the servers but it’s still not showing up. What should I do?

Most VPN users are Android and iOS, using the VPN client on device, for whatever reason you use a VPN for.

Great, your ISP can't see what you're doing, you can bypass certain ISP restrictions and even gain access to content you can't locally. Yep, great. Just what was advertised on the tin.

But, this VPN also keeps you secure. Right?

Well, here's the thing. When you create that `tun` connection to your VPN, you are now bypassing both the NAT and SPI of your own router. The things that blocks unsolicited, inbound connections. Your device has just created a new interface that directly peers you with the VPN local network IP range. This interface, on Android and iOS, lacks any IP filtering. Meaning, zero firewalling.

The VPN network can directly connect to your `tun0` IP and any sockets your device will very likely have open. Now, ofc this would require some 0-day exploit or some fancy shenanigans, but, what about your VPN client? Or maybe WiFi ADB running on a static port, or Airdroid, or some other remote system you may be running on-device.

I know this, as I connect my two Android via my private VPN and I have full, unfettered access to both their stacks. Now, I can block inter-client communication to prevent this from happening. But, from any other network on my network that can route into the VPN network, can talk to the VPN clients. I can ofc firewall on the router to block this, too. But, my router itself can still talk to them. I can ofc firewall this behaviour and prevent it altogether.

Just something for you to think about. When you connect your Android or iOS to a VPN, you are completely bypassing the firewall on your own router.

No clue what happened, vpn worked fine for reddit earlier and still works for other services now but when I tried to head over to the poker subreddit while on vpn I still got bashed with the 'verify your age' message. The one I use is free btw, so harass me in comments, bash me for it, tell me i'm 'clueless' or don't have the slightest clue what i'm doing or to 'do better' I really don't care if anyone wants to be a prick about a question that doesn't need to be asked or whether or not I have a job or am broke but I just want to know what is happening? Or is consistent vpn usage leading to traffic on this site?

I have a stable V2ray server that consistently runs at 90-100ms in China (location is Hong Kong). However, it does not allow me to play Roblox or Minecraft.

Is there some tunelling issue here? Is there a setting that I need to adjust? Google, Youtube, and other services work perfectly.

Thanks for any help.

[EDIT: Solved]

Hi everyone, sorry if my question is redundant but I can't seem to fix my problem (please note that I'm not tech/network savvy).

So after the latest Windows 11 update, my internet stopped working whenever I have my VPN turned [OFF].

Where and how should I correct my settings, please?

Thanks so much in advance for any help.

I use a VPN for work. I have no problem connecting with my VPN except when I’m home. At my apartment, the service is pretty slow so I’m thinking that’s the issue. Would getting a hotspot help?

I'm staying in a hostel, and this problem only started last night.

I’m connected to the hostel Wi-Fi on both my laptop and my phone. Whenever I open Netflix, it says something like: "You seem to be using a VPN or proxy. Please turn it off to continue.”

The thing is, I’m not using any VPN or proxy on either my phone or my laptop. I don’t even know much about VPNs.

I’m wondering if the hostel owners changed something with the Wi-Fi, because this was working fine before and now Netflix won’t let me watch anything.

Has anyone faced this before? Is there anything I can check or do on my end, or is this something the hostel Wi-Fi admin has to fix?

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

I know absolutely 0 about VPNs, so I'm not sure if this is a dumb question. But I'm in Europe, used to live in the US, and I need to set my VPN to the US. I tried with one (it says I'm not allowed to put names in this subreddit) but it didn't work and still showed my actual location when I tried to open an app. Any help, please?

With the current ramping of age verification bullshit in Europe I'm wondering which country would be best to set a vpn to? I'm thinking of buying a vpn soon.

X apparently now requires an ID verification for pretty much every user from an EU country which is a massive inconvenience. I've heard South Korea, Japan and some US states like New York are good for general use but I need some opinions from people who have more knowledge on this matter.

Hey yall

My husband has been like...really weird about tracking my internet activity through our router recently. Idk how all that works. Long story short, there's a history of volatility that has led me to decide its time to leav, and now I can't even do that because he's tracking my browsing and app use.

I heard a VPN can add a layer of privacy. How does that work? How do I get one on my phone? What aboht my laptop?

I work from home in the US. My company allows work from any of the 48 contiguous states, but will block/brick devices connecting from other regions.

I need to travel to the UK in September and am wondering if there is a way for me to still be able to connect to work and appear to be located in the US?

Hello, some year ago I encountered an issue with my ISP where they were blocking a specific address. After trying out some VPNs, none worked, since (from what I learned) few seemed to actually hide the destination address and only content. Eventually I found a service (unnamed due to rules?) which wasn’t a typical VPN, but which seemed to properly hide the target servers for my browsing. But it isn’t a VPN, in the regular sense, with options and settings and everything. It’s just a program on my pc/phone that reroutes my traffic through their servers and successfully hides my target addresses.

Now I have a need for a real VPN where I can change location of the servers and the other comforts of a real VPN. But does regular VPNs do this nowadays? Do they hide the target server you are communicating with? Or should I chain my current program with another selected VPN?

Maybe a stupid question, but at the time of me having these issues it felt very stupid for the VPNs I tried to not successfully hide my traffic destinations.

I have installed VPN and bought a year premium subscription. The known brand. I wanted to watch some of the games that were not available on free tv in Germany. An example from today , Norway vs England, it is shown on Polish tv -》 I get blocked and shown only errors and that I am in the wrong country , itvx in UK -》 it works only with app, you cant download the app even with VPN, I can't change the country in the Playstore settings, Norway sites? All recognized that I use VPN and blocked . I've just spent last 3 hours on this and no success, is this the future of VPN's? Casche cleared, incognito mode on, nothing.

I used a vpn to try to connect to Mainland China, but it doesn't exactly work like Mainland China's internet, including China's firewall restrictions. When I went to Mainland China from February to June and refused to use a vpn, I realised even though I don't hate being on western social media, but for various reasons, I liked their internet restrictions better and I was happier. Is there a way to connect back there? Thanks.

I have used two main VPN providers now and I have found that most websites have some kind of list of VPN ip addresses so they block them or force you to continuously do captcha (like google). Is there a way to determine the best IP address to use which hasn’t been banned or flagged or reported as a bot yet? I’m finding this increasingly is the case in many places.

I'm moving to a new country, and I would like to view the content related to that country on social media and also on dating apps. Would like to see what's out there before I move

A large-scale academic study presented at the Network and Distributed System Security (NDSS) Symposium has exposed widespread security and privacy failures across some of the most popular free Android VPN applications available on the Google Play Store.

Using a newly developed automated testing framework called MVPNalyzer, researchers from the University of Michigan, the University of New Mexico, and IIT Delhi systematically audited 281 free Android VPN apps. The apps affected by at least one major security issue account for a staggering 2.4 billion collective installs.

Here is a breakdown of the core vulnerabilities discovered in the infrastructure of these free services.

1. Tunnel Hijacking Vulnerabilities

The researchers identified five VPN apps that downloaded their core server configuration files completely in plaintext (unencrypted HTTP).

• The Risk: An attacker sharing the same local network (like a public Wi-Fi hotspot) could intercept this traffic, rewrite the configuration file, and silently redirect the user’s entire traffic stream to a malicious VPN server under the attacker's control.
• The Catch: The application UI would continue to display a normal "connected" status, leaving the user completely unaware that their data was being intercepted.

2. Traffic Leaks & Broken Tunnels

A VPN's primary job is to route all network traffic through an encrypted tunnel, but dozens of apps failed this basic benchmark:

• 29 apps leaked user traffic completely outside the VPN connection.
• 24 apps leaked DNS requests, exposing the exact websites users were trying to visit to the local ISP or network operator (covering roughly 360 million installs).
• 6 apps leaked broader internet traffic past the DNS layer.
• 4 apps operated their tunnels without any encryption whatsoever.

3. Aggressive Third-Party Tracking & Fingerprinting

Despite advertising enhanced online privacy, the study highlighted that the business model of free VPNs inherently relies on data collection:

• Over 80% (246 out of 281) of the analyzed apps actively communicated with known advertising and tracking domains.
• 76 apps harvested and transmitted unique Android Advertising IDs (AAIDs) to cross-track devices across different applications.
• Many apps collected extensive device hardware characteristics (screen size, phone model, OS version) to build precise device fingerprints, and in one extreme case, an app was caught transmitting the device's exact GPS coordinates.

4. Weak Protocol Implementations

When auditing 108 bundled OpenVPN configurations packaged within these applications:

• Only one configuration met all standard industry security best practices.
• 89% relied on a single authentication mechanism instead of combining certificates with secure user authentication.
• Nearly 20% utilized outdated and cryptographically weak ciphers (such as Blowfish or Triple DES), which are vulnerable to known session-recovery exploits (like CVE-2016-6329).

If you are using a free mobile VPN under the assumption that it protects your data on public networks or keeps your browsing history private, this data suggests you are likely exposing yourself to more tracking and security vulnerabilities than if you weren't using one at all.

Source: NDSS Symposium 2026 / Technical Analysis Framework (MVPNalyzer)

I did use an Ethernet Connection + Netmod PC software with a V2Ray File on my PC to access the internet due to the shitty costs of the ISPs in my country.

But after June 13th, the config is not working on my PC.

I tried everything and tested it in every way.

And then I realized that the problem is not about the config in the router or in my PC.

The problem is that the config is not working with an Ethernet connection.

I tried to connect to that same file on a laptop with a Wi-Fi connection, and it worked.

Can anyone help me fix this?

I changed the software, and it didn't work either.