A few days ago, one of the my frequent readers (Pilgrim) let me know that ItsHidden does not work as it used to do. For some time the free accounts disconnect every 20 minutes. Moreover, the policy of this service is that no support is offered for the free accounts.
The message made me think a little bit about the free VPN accounts and the user expectations. Here is what I think …
First of all, VPN services are not cheap to be built and to be maintained. Powerful dedicated servers have to be purchased, qualified admins have to keep an eye on them, clean IP addresses are need, etc.
An important challenge for every VPN service provider is the support. For a large number of users it can be overwhelming. That is why some some of the services that provide free VPN are not able to offer support.
Most of the time free accounts are offered in order to promote the paid services. After the initial phase of promotion some of the services may stop offering free accounts or limit them, as it is the case of ItsHidden. Some others, like HideIpVPN or InvisibleBrowsingVPN, offer a limited number of free accounts per week.
Some other free VPNs are ad-based, for example, Hotspot Shield and TheFreeVPN [No longer available]. These show ads for every page that you visit. Sometimes it can be very annoying.
What can you expect from a free VPN service?
- Low/medium speed
- Little or no support
- Advertising
- Service interruption
My conclusion is that free VPN accounts have to be taken as they are, with the good and the bad. The users always have to keep in mind that they are … FREE.
3 Comments
I agree with everything in the article.
I have several VPN options, one was a free license that I was given the rest are free to everybody.
What made the changes with ItsHidden stand out was that when I started using it last year there were no restrictions and the changes were made without any warning, to this day in terms of speed and reliability it is still one of the best VPN’s that I have used.
As far as support goes, in this case I have never even thought about it, as it is a PPTP VPN setup is simple and straightforward, provided you get that right the only problem you are liable to encounter is if the server goes down, something that I have never experienced with ItsHidden.
If a provider is prepared to offer their services and/or their software free their generosity is to be appreciated, especially by those who could not otherwise afford to use it.
If their intention is to try to increase the number of paid subscribers that is only common business sense.
But there are occasions when the restrictions imposed on free offers limit their use to the point where they are not worth the trouble. I do not feel that ItsHidden has quite reached that point but I would not, for instance, install USA IP because in 7 minutes you can do very little especially if websites are slow loading or you need to login to an email account. To me having to keep reconnecting somewhat defeats the object.
My final comment is about the reasons why people use VPN’s and Proxies.
In my case it is for privacy and therefore security.
If you are using either and it suddenly switches off and leaves your real IP exposed I consider that a cause for concern.
I accept that this could happen anyway, at any time and with any provider, but when it is done intentionally and initially in this case without any warning ….?
Having said all that I still have ItsHidden set up on both my computers but would only use it if my preffered VPN went down or I needed an NL IP address.
I totally agree with you.Still,you have to be careful with VPN services,especially free ones.Most are suspicious,you could be tracked,spammed,scammed or infected.Unfortunately ItsHidden offers free P2P in Netherlands which is very tricky.As far as I know only Spain allows legal P2P traffic.That’s why I’m suspicious about it.I think that free VPN services that allow P2P traffic are not trustworthy,because of security issues and the high cost for servers.Something is wrong with this picture.
@Metodios – @Pilgrim -Thank you both for your comments. They will surely help those that use or want to use free VPN services.
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