It is an encrypted, private connection into a network. If you work from home, you use a VPN to connect to the corporate network, and while you are connected, any connections to the internet, etc., come out of the corporate network, not directly from you. It protects the company and you, and is just like you were “on the site” connected directly to the internal corporate network.
A private VPN is an encrypted private connection into the vendor’s network. So, when you are connected to the private VPN, you connect to a particular VPN server, and then all the connections you make to the internet (web, email, etc.) will look as if they are coming from the VPN company’s network, and not from your computer or ISP. Any traffic is encrypted from the VPN company to your machine. It also “hides” your IP address, as it is an IP address assigned by the VPN company (it is one of theirs) and your IP address from your ISP is not seen by any connections.
Most of the private VPN companies do not record your incoming IP address, and don’t log anything related to you personally, as they take your money to keep things private. Additionally, if you choose an off-shore company, they don’t fall under the jurisdiction of US laws, etc.
So, if you do like I do (I rotate VPN servers that I log into on a daily/weekly basis) your connections into the internet will look as if the are coming from, say, Canada, New Zealand, Germany, etc. The main limitation is speed (some locations are not as quick as others, although it is still fast); and on websites that use source IP addresses to “determine” your location and tailor the web pages to what they think your location is (i.e. time zones, temperature presentation [Centigrade versus Celsius on weather websites], etc.) will not be what they “should” be.
Costs are generally about 10$ per month, and several allow many selections of servers to log into, both in the US, and in other countries all over the world.
It just helps preserve/keep anonymity of IP addresses and traffic. Combined with encrypted, good search engines, and prudent practices protecting your ID on the web, it adds several additional layers of protection for you.
Thank you for your informative and helpful post. One can always count on FReepers for an answer. I’m going to look into it.