South African residents concerned about their privacy online or who need their web traffic to look like it originates from another country can subscribe to one of numerous virtual private network (VPN) providers.<\/p>\n
A VPN acts as an intermediary between a user and the Internet by diverting traffic through servers with a different Internet protocol (IP) address than the user’s own.<\/p>\n
That could add an extra layer of protection against cyberattacks and shield users from snooping.<\/p>\n
In addition to enhanced security and privacy, some VPN providers offer features like bypassing geographic restrictions.<\/p>\n
Although this is often advertised as a way to access geoblocked content on streaming services like Netflix, this form of “piracy<\/a><\/strong>“, as content owners have termed it, is not the only use for such a feature.<\/p>\n Bypassing geoblocks lets users purchase items from merchants that restrict who can buy from their online store, provided they also have a parcel forwarding service in a country that can receive the products.<\/p>\n This was one way to import just-launched Google Pixel devices<\/a><\/strong> to South Africa.<\/p>\n While there are many advanced features VPNs offer the tech-savvy in addition to geo-unblocking, among the most important to the general user should be the following:<\/p>\n Below is a list of established VPN providers available to South Africans that offer much in the way of these features.<\/p>\n If government-driven surveillance is your primary concern, then it would perhaps be best to avoid those services headquartered in one of the countries that are part of the so-called Five Eyes alliance.<\/p>\n These countries are Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States.<\/p>\n Since the Cold War, they have had intelligence-sharing agreements aimed at protecting their national security.<\/p>\n However, privacy and security experts have warned about the potential abuse of these agreements to target government whistleblowers.<\/p>\n On top of the countries listed above, there are also those that form part of the Nine Eyes and Fourteen Eyes alliances, which are as follows:<\/p>\n Other countries seen to be close allies of the Fourteen Eyes alliance include Israel, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and British Overseas Territories.<\/p>\n These two alliances are considered less invasive when it comes to sharing their citizens’ personal data for law enforcement purposes.<\/p>\n If you are hell-bent on keeping your Internet traffic as secure as possible, we found IVPN to be one of the most sensible options on the market.<\/p>\n The provider prides itself on not requiring any personal information from the user during the sign-up process.<\/p>\n Even if IVPN was forced to provide its data to the government or suffered a cyberattack, it assured any information would be incredibly difficult to link to a user.<\/p>\n For the most geographically diverse, Surfshark appears to be a good option.<\/p>\n It has servers in 100 countries, providing the best coverage among the prominent VPN providers.<\/p>\n However, it has fewer servers overall than Private Internet Access, CyberGhost and NordVPN, which might prove to offer better performance than Surfshark as a result.<\/p>\n If you want to try out a VPN service before committing, you can initially subscribe on a month-to-month basis.<\/p>\n Alternatively, opting for a longer-term deal will usually qualify you for a 30-day money-back guarantee if you are unsatisfied with the service.<\/p>\n On a long-term commitment of 36 months, Atlas VPN is the cheapest, with an effective monthly cost of $1.99 per month, around R38 based on the exchange rate at the time of writing.<\/p>\n On a month-to-month basis, Mullvad VPN was the most affordable, with a \u20ac5 (R103) price across the board.<\/p>\n The table below summarises the features and prices of major VPN services available to home users.<\/p>\n Some of the services listed below also come in a variety of tiers that add features such as password managers and cloud storage.<\/p>\n Here are 10 reputable VPN service providers South African residents can choose from.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":489109,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[85829,63104,63138,35,85827,85831,52789,58920,63855,63393,58926,31696],"class_list":["post-489065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-security","tag-atlas-vpn","tag-cyberghost","tag-expressvpn","tag-headline","tag-ivpn","tag-mullvad-vpn","tag-nordvpn","tag-private-internet-access","tag-protonvpn","tag-surfshark","tag-tunnelbear","tag-virtual-private-network-vpn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489065"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=489065"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489065\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":492033,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489065\/revisions\/492033"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/489109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=489065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=489065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=489065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
\n
\n\n
\n Top VPN services for home users<\/strong><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n VPN service<\/strong><\/td>\n Country of headquarters
\n<\/strong><\/td>\nServers and countries<\/strong><\/td>\n Maximum devices<\/strong><\/td>\n Supported platforms<\/strong><\/td>\n Price<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Atlas VPN<\/td>\n United States<\/span><\/strong><\/td>\n 1,000 servers
\n42 countries<\/td>\nUnlimited<\/td>\n Android
\nChromeOS
\nFireTV
\niOS
\nLinux
\nMacOS
\nWindows<\/td>\n$71.52 \/ R1,314<\/strong> (36 months)
\n$49.01 \/ R900<\/strong> (12 months)
\n$11.99 \/ R220<\/strong> (month-to-month)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n CyberGhost<\/td>\n Romania<\/strong><\/span><\/td>\n 8,900 servers
\n91 countries<\/td>\n7<\/td>\n Android
\nAndroid TV
\nChrome
\nFirefox
\nFireTV
\niOS
\nLinux
\nMacOS<\/td>\n$56.94 \/ R1,046<\/strong> (24 months)
\n$41.94 \/ R770<\/strong> (6 months)
\n$12.99 \/ R239<\/strong> (month-to-month)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n ExpressVPN<\/td>\n British Virgin Islands<\/span><\/strong><\/td>\n 3,000 servers
\n94 countries<\/td>\n5<\/td>\n Android
\nChromeOS
\nLinux
\nMacOS
\nKindle Fire
\nWindows
\nSelect Asus, Linksys, and Netgear routers<\/td>\n$59.94 \/ R1,101<\/strong>\u00a0 (6 months)
\n$80.04 \/ R1,470<\/strong> (12 + 3 months)
\n$12.95 \/ R238<\/strong>\u00a0 (month-to-month)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n IVPN<\/td>\n Gibraltar<\/strong><\/span><\/td>\n 140 servers
\n35 countries<\/td>\n7<\/td>\n Android
\niOS
\nLinux
\nMacOS
\nWindows<\/td>\n$220 \/ R4,040<\/strong> (36 months)
\n$160 \/ R2,938<\/strong> (24 months)
\n$100 \/ R1,836<\/strong> (12 months)
\n$10 \/ R184<\/strong> (month-to-month)
\n$4 \/ R73 (weekly)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n NordVPN<\/td>\n Panama<\/strong><\/span><\/td>\n 5,000 servers
\n60 countries<\/td>\n6<\/td>\n Android
\nAndroid TV
\nChrome
\nChromecast
\nChromeOS
\nFirefox
\nEdge
\nFireTV
\nKindle Fire
\nMacOS
\nNintendo Switch
\nOculus
\nPlayStation
\nRaspberry Pi
\nXbox
\nWindows<\/td>\n$88.83 \/ R1,632<\/strong> (24 + 3 months)
\n$68.85 \/ R1,264<\/strong> (12 + 3 months)
\n$12.99 \/ R239<\/strong> (month-to-month)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n Mullvad VPN<\/td>\n Sweden<\/strong><\/span><\/td>\n 663 servers
\n41 countries<\/td>\n5<\/td>\n Linux
\nMacOS
\nWindows<\/td>\n\u20ac5 \/ R102<\/strong> per month on all plans<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Private Internet Access<\/td>\n United States<\/span><\/strong><\/td>\n 35,000
\n84 countries<\/td>\nUnlimited<\/td>\n Amazon Luna
\nAndroid
\nApple TV
\nChrome
\nChromecast
\nFirefox
\nFireTV
\niOS
\nIP TV
\nMacOS
\nNintendo Switch VPN
\nOpera
\nPlayStation
\nTizen
\nShield TV
\nwebOS
\nWindows
\nXbox<\/td>\n$79 \/ R1,452<\/strong> (36 months)
\n$39.95 \/ R734<\/strong> (12 months)
\n$11.95 \/ R220<\/strong> (month-to-month)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n ProtonVPN<\/td>\n Switzerland<\/strong><\/span><\/td>\n 1,900 servers
\n65 countries<\/td>\n10<\/td>\n Android
\niOS
\nLinux
\nMacOS
\nWindows<\/td>\n\u20ac119.76 \/ R2,411<\/strong> (24 months)
\n\u20ac71.88 \/ R1,448<\/strong> (12 months)
\n\u20ac9.99 \/ R201<\/strong> (month-to-month)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n Surfshark<\/td>\n Netherlands<\/strong><\/span><\/td>\n 3,200 servers
\n100 countries<\/td>\nUnlimited<\/td>\n Android
\nChrome
\nEdge
\nFirefox
\nFireTV
\niOS
\nLinux
\nMacOS
\nPlayStation
\nWindows
\nXbox<\/td>\n$59.76 \/ R1,098<\/strong>\u00a0 (24 + 1 months)
\n$59.76 \/ R1,098<\/strong> (12 months)
\n$12.95 \/ R238<\/strong> (month-to-month)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n TunnelBear<\/td>\n Canada<\/strong><\/span><\/td>\n 3,000 servers
\n48 countries<\/td>\nUnlimited<\/td>\n Android
\nChrome
\niOS
\nMacOS
\nWindows<\/td>\n$120 \/ R2,204<\/strong> (36 months)
\n$59.88 \/ R1,100<\/strong> (12 months)
\n$9.99 \/ R183<\/strong> (month-to-month)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\n Green<\/strong> <\/span>\u2014 not part of any “Eyes” alliance<\/em>
\nOrange<\/span><\/strong> \u2014 part of Nine or Fourteen Eyes alliances<\/em>
\nRed<\/span><\/strong> \u2014 part of Five Eyes alliance<\/em><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\nNow read: Proton launches password manager<\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"