Private VPN Setup
If you value privacy and want to browse the web anonymously, a VPN is a very good option. A VPN (Virtual Private Network) is a simple and effective way to protect your internet traffic and anonymise your online identity. When you connect to a secure VPN server, your internet traffic is sent through an encrypted tunnel from you to the VPN server and the VPN server forwards the request to the website you want to visit. The server on the website you want to visit sends the requested page back to your VPN server, which then forwards it to you through an encrypted tunnel. This means that the websites you visit only see the IP address of the VPN server not your own private IP address.
In order to achieve privacy and anonymity, you can either subscribe to a commercial VPN service, or you can set up your own VPN server on a VPS that you rent from a cloud service provider. In this tutorial we will explore the second option. I will show you how to set up a private VPN server, manage the VPN server and configure access to it from a Windows client. I will try to keep the tutorial as simple as possible so even beginners will be able to follow it.
In this tutorial I have decided to focus on SoftEther VPN software. Even though SoftEther VPN is relatively new it has become quite popular because it is secure, reliable and open-source. It is also very fast (according to the people behind SoftEther VPN it is 4 times faster than Microsoft's PPTP VPN and 13 times faster that OpenVPN). Other advantages of SoftEther VPN include support for multiple protocols (SoftEther Protocol, OpenVPN, L2TP/IPSec, and SSTP) as well as strong encryption, cross-platform compatibility, and high-performance networking.
Even though SoftEther VPN is very powerful, it also has some disadvantages, one of it being that it can be quite complicated and difficult to set up and manage. However, if you follow this tutorial you will end up with a pretty good private VPN server for your personal use.