{"id":1068,"date":"2015-10-19T17:48:35","date_gmt":"2015-10-20T00:48:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/?p=1068"},"modified":"2015-10-19T17:48:35","modified_gmt":"2015-10-20T00:48:35","slug":"1068","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/2015\/10\/19\/1068\/","title":{"rendered":"New Sophos series: &#8220;What is &#8230;?&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/sophos.com\">Sophos<\/a>, the esteemed network-security company, is starting a new series on its always erudite blog. It is called &#8220;What Is &#8230;,&#8221; and it promises to turn &#8220;technical jargon into plain English.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The inaugural post, written by <a href=\"https:\/\/nakedsecurity.sophos.com\/author\/pducklin\/\">Paul Ducklin<\/a>, is called &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.sophos.com\/2015\/10\/19\/what-is-a-vpn\/?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sophos%2FdgdY+%28Sophos%29\">What is &#8230; a VPN?<\/a>&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>VPN stands for &#8220;virtual private network.&#8221; Writes Ducklin:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>On your own network, you get to set the security rules.<\/p>\n<p>You can make sure your router has a decent password; you can keep everything patched; you can run security software on all your devices; and so on.<\/p>\n<p>But once you\u2019re on the road, whether it\u2019s free Wi-Fi at the coffee shop or the business network in the airport lounge, you don\u2019t have the same control.<\/p>\n<p>For all you know, the network you\u2019re using might not merely have been hacked by crooks, it might have been set up by crooks in the first place.<\/p>\n<p>One solution is to be careful, and stick to secure websites for sensitive work such as uploading documents or online banking.<\/p>\n<p>But you are probably giving away plenty of information anyway:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Some secure websites include links to insecure sites, which leave a visible trail.<\/li>\n<li>Some applications use secure connections, but don\u2019t bother to check if they\u2019re talking to an imposter server.<\/li>\n<li>Some applications use insecure connections, but don\u2019t tell you.<\/li>\n<li>When a program connects to, say,<tt> https:\/\/bank.example\/<\/tt>, it first asks the network, \u201cI need<tt> bank.example<\/tt>. Where do I find it?\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In other words, your computer\u2019s internet connection is a bit like a conversation two rows behind you on the bus: even if most of it is inaudible, you can nevertheless be pretty sure what it\u2019s about.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s where a <strong>VPN<\/strong>, short for <strong>Virtual Private Network<\/strong>, comes in.<\/p>\n<p>The idea is surprisingly simple.<\/p>\n<p>You get your computer to encrypt <strong>all<\/strong> your network data (even if it\u2019s already encrypted!) before it leaves your laptop or phone, and send the scrambled stream of data back to your own network.<\/p>\n<p>When the scrambled data is safely back on home turf, it is decrypted.<\/p>\n<p>Only then is it sent onto the internet in its unscrambled form, just as if you were at home.<\/p>\n<p>The encrypted internet link, known in the trade as a <i>tunnel<\/i>, acts like an long, secure, extension cable plugged into your own network.<\/p>\n<p>Unless the crooks can crack into the encrypted tunnel itself, they\u2019re no better off at hacking you than if you were back at home or in the office.<\/p>\n<p>So, you have neutralised any advantage the crooks were hoping for because you were on the road.<\/p>\n<p>And that, very briefly, is a VPN.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.sophos.com\/2015\/10\/19\/what-is-a-vpn\/?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sophos%2FdgdY+%28Sophos%29\">Read the whole thing<\/a>. It is completely lucid.<\/p>\n<p>This is a wonderful start to the series.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sophos, the esteemed network-security company, is starting a new series on its always erudite blog. It is called &#8220;What Is &#8230;,&#8221; and it promises to turn &#8220;technical jargon into plain English.&#8221; The inaugural post, written by Paul Ducklin, is called &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/2015\/10\/19\/1068\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[19,76,89,92],"class_list":["post-1068","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-roberts-posts","tag-clarity","tag-plain-english","tag-resources-3","tag-security-2"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1068","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1068"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1068\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1068"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1068"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nocontest.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1068"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}