A key concept to understand about VPN technologies is the difference between anonymity and privacy. Anonymity is the ability of a network or system user to remain unknown. Tools that support anonymous access include Tor (www.torproject.org), an open-source software and network to surf the web anonymously. A hardware solution that leverages the Tor network for anonymity is VyprVPN (www.anonabox.com/partners/vyprvpn). The problem with solutions for anonymity is that they do not always protect your privacy. In many cases, the traffic carried anonymously by these applications is unencrypted, which means an attacker can read it with access to the right part of the network. If you are passing user IDs and passwords, credit card numbers, or other information that you would like to keep private, these are not the correct solutions for you.

Privacy, on the other hand, is keeping information about a network or system user from disclosure. If you want to protect your information, a VPN connection does an excellent job of this by encrypting the data that it carries. Leverage VPNs whenever you are connected to an untrustworthy network and want to send sensitive information. Wireless networks are a particularly ripe environment for attackers trying to get private information from a public network. VPNs do not offer any anonymity, however, because you are always able to track the endpoints of a VPN connection, and that information is needed to maintain the VPN connection.