When was VPN Invented? Learn About the Origins of the Tunneling Protocol

When was VPN Invented

Privacy and security have long been some of the essential needs of the human race, in all ventures. With the rise and popularity of the personal computers, the Internet, smartphones, tablets and other gadgets, the search for those two characteristics is even more intense.

Virtual Private Networks appeared on the scene as tools that could help users achieve a more secure connection, hiding its traffic and data shared as well as its IP address. This way, the VPN client would have considerable gains in privacy, security, and anonymity, providing peace of mind to the use of the Internet and remote connections.

The VPN encryption technology has been with us for 21 years. A worker at Microsoft, the world’s leader in technology development at the time, invented VPN with the intention of creating a safer connection environment between the computer or device and the Internet.

Initially, only businesses and enterprises benefited from VPN, because it allowed them to establish communication methods both of the internal and of the external variety without the information leaking in any way. But with the rigors of time and a security crisis in the early 2000’s, more and more particular users began to trust VPN as a way to create a private, safer environment for connections between a user and the Internet.

History and background

After experimenting with computer networks since the sixties, when the US Military intelligence created the ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network) for communication with remote locations, the Internet was born.

After a couple of couple of decades of electronic communications and connectivity powered in no small part by tech powerhouses like IBM and AT&T since the mid-eighties and from that point on with other well-known brands that started to develop and provide Internet connectivity, new needs and requirements appeared in the scene.

Many businesses, governmental institutions, military and intelligence corps, among other organizations, needed to access connectivity with remote locations without anybody seeing or spying on the data shared either way. This created the perfect scenario for the invention of VPN.

So when was VPN invented?

The Virtual Private Network was invented because the world demanded it at the time. Not coincidentally, people use VPN every day with increasing frequency, and it is all thanks to a Microsoft worker.

Gurdeep Singh-Pall, who was working with Microsoft at the time, developed the Peer-to-peer Tunneling Protocol, also called Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol, shortened with the initials PPTP. The method allowed users to implement a virtual network that endorsed and promoted privacy and anonymity while sharing data from any point.

Sing-Pall, who began working with Microsoft in 1990 as a software design engineer, was also one of the pioneers of the LAN Manager Remote Access Service. He accrued vast experience, knowledge and world fame because of his work in Windows and Skype.

The invention of VPN came as a way to engage in remote communications securely and privately, but people were not aware of all the threats and dangers that lurk around the Internet as they do now. Because of that, VPNs are now a world-famous commodity, and a quality service is just a few clicks and a few bucks away.

What motivated the invention and rise of VPN?

When was VPN Invented? Learn About the Origins of the Tunneling Protocol

People, especially business owners and managers, needed to implement a way to protect the information they shared among internal network users, and all types of organizations, especially governmental institutions, and non-profit corps, were constant victims of hackers stealing data and personal information with the intention of gaining a benefit from it.

So, the business and organizations mentioned needed to create a much safer environment for data and traffic sharing than that of the average Internet user. The tunneling protocol worked like a charm to solve these issues.

Virtual Private Networks, or VPN, are online privacy-enhancing tools that allow you to successfully hide your IP address when you connect to the World Wide Web.  It encrypts your data and traffic, meaning that your browsing history and favorite addresses, personal information, login usernames and passwords from all your preferred social media outlets and subscription pages, and your credit card information won’t suffer the advances of any third party looking to have access to it.

With a VPN, your traffic gets “tunneled” and sent in a secure way to a remote server, who will assign you a temporary, different IP address than yours, unless you choose to pay a little more and get a dedicated, or static, IP address, which will be only yours.

There are several types of VPN, and the encryption technologies they use can vary from provider to provider. Some of the protocols of encryption that the best VPNs use are L2TP/IPsec, OpenVPN, PPTP, and SSTP. They may change according to the brand you choose, and to the goal you set: some are better suited to be personal VPNs, while others may work best as business VPNs.

Best VPNs in the Market

There are numerous VPN options in the world. You should now that some of them are free, but getting a free VPN can be a problem because the ads present in them could be the door for viruses and infections, and their security protocols aren´t nearly as efficient as some of the most reliable VPN providers, like TorGuard, use.

TorGuard is widely regarded as one of the best VPN because it allows you to connect through servers in almost any location in the world. Besides, it gives you the possibility to connect five different devices at the same time, plus its customer service is top-notch. Other good choices are PIA (Private Internet Access), GhostVPN, and IPVanish.

Using a VPN can bring many good things to your internet experience. For example, you can get the best of online streaming multimedia centers, services, and channels around the globe: you can watch every Netflix region, BBC, MLB, Hulu, Star Sports, CBC, Telemundo, Al-Jazeera news, and many top sites and broadcast services. VPNs help you mask your real IP address and choose to connect through a direction of the country of your choosing.

For example, if you want to watch Canada’s CBC, but you are currently working in Spain, you will not be able to do it under normal circumstances because of the geographical restrictions blocking the channel’s content only for Canadian residents. But with a Canadian IP address that your VPN provider will give you, you will successfully bypass the blocking and watch the channel just as if you were in Canada.

With VPNs, you can be anonymous online and protect your traffic and data from hackers and any other possible meddlers, you can stream content, you can play games online, and you can combat censorship. Some countries, like North Korea, China, and Eritrea, restrict Internet access, but if you are in one of those nations and connect to a server from another country, you will enter sites that in different scenarios you wouldn’t be able to visit.

When was VPN Invented? Learn About the Origins of the Tunneling Protocol When was VPN Invented? Learn About the Origins of the Tunneling Protocol
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VPN used in the world

Approximately 25% of adults around the world with access to Internet protect their digital goods with a Virtual Private Network. Indonesia, Thailand, and Turkey, all hovering around 40%, lead the way when it comes to VPN use, while the United States is far away with 16%, according to the Global Web Index.

In conclusion, this fascinating online tool to help enhance your privacy and anonymity exists since 1996, when a Microsoft engineer who later reached essential positions in Windows and Skype developed the Peer-to-Peer Tunneling Protocol, or PPTP, to establish a secure environment where people could share their traffic to remote servers.

This technology, initially designed to help businesses and organizations such as government, intelligence, military and non-profit corps, was later adopted by specific, ordinary people looking to secure their online sessions and maintain anonymity for various things.

VPN now is helping create a safe connection to nearly 25% of the adults of the world, which use this tool for online streaming, live sports events, privacy and hacker prevention, to avoid censorships, to access geo-blocked sites around the globe, and several other things.

Passion for Cyber Security and Technology.

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