What is a VPN?

“VPN” stands for “Virtual Private Network”.

• “Virtual” means we use software to create the network, not hardware. This allows us to connect machines that are not physically close together.
• “Private” means we use encryption to protect your communications from those who might be watching–such as other devices connected to the same WiFi network, your Internet Service Provider (ISP), or your employer (among others)–and we only allow people you have approved access for to connect to the network.
• “Network” means the attached computers can communicate with each other.

One common use for a VPN is allowing remote workers to log into and securely access their employer’s internal network, but there are many more benefits! VPNs can mask your physical location, prevent bad actors from capturing your personal information on public networks, and let you collaborate securely with your team when all of you aren’t in the same place.

VPN Types

These VPN types are how Nettica defines our services. Other organizations might use these terms or similar ones, but some of them might not define them the same way Nettica does.

• Relay: with a Nettica Relay VPN, some of your network traffic goes through the VPN, allowing you to access the resources on the other side of the VPN. The rest of your network traffic uses your normal internet address and location. Relay mode is used for connecting to your work network while still allowing you to access the internet without restrictions. Relay VPNs do NOT protect your non-work internet traffic, and they do NOT obscure your physical location.
• Tunnel: with a Nettica Tunnel VPN, all your network traffic goes through the VPN. Tunnel mode is great for protecting yourself against bad actors on shared public networks, and for obscuring your physical location.
• Multi-Hop: a Nettica Multi-Hop VPN is similar to a Tunnel, with the additional security of locating the VPN your device connects to (“ingress”) and the VPN that provides your access to the Internet (“egress”) in different physical locations. With this separation, and both VPNs set to “no logs” by default, it becomes nearly impossible for bad actors to connect your Internet activity with your location, because there is nothing recording traffic between the two VPNs. This extra security does come with some extra costs, though: a Multi-Hop VPN requires maintaining two VPN services, which consumes 2 of your account credits instead of 1.
• In The Wild: In the Wild is a feature unique to Nettica VPN. Nettica’s admin service is open-source, which means you do not have to rely on our infrastructure. You can install and run your own Nettica VPN server and keep your own domain, authentication, and database in your own infrastructure and under your exclusive control. You can add tunnel and relay VPN services directly on your local server. You can run Nettica VPN In the Wild on a device as small as a Raspberry Pi*, on any cloud VM, or on any Linux machine you own. Your users can connect to your In the Wild VPNs exactly the same way they do to VPNs hosted by Nettica. If you’d like to mix and match your own VPN server with Nettica’s regional tunnels or relays, you can add those services to your In the Wild VPN server. (We call it “In the Wild” because—by design—we don’t know anything about the devices we’re providing service to.)

* Raspberry Pi devices have always been a significant part of our development efforts, and everyone at Nettica VPN runs their own Raspberry Pi VPN at home for their personal network security. Raspberry Pi VPNs are a full-featured product that get our full support.