In recent years, internet users have increasingly resorted to virtual private networks (VPNs) to protect their online privacy. However, amid a slew of social media restrictions and efforts around the world to ban online apps outright, VPNs are evidently being used as a tool to combat censorship.
A VPN is an internet tool that protects a user’s information by masking their device’s IP address, allowing a user to surf the web privately. By modifying their geographic location, VPNs often also allow users to evade common regional restrictions.
In Turkey, after Twitter began blocking specific content leading up to the country’s presidential elections in May, VPN companies reported a significant surge in VPN usage in Turkey, according to TechRadar. The VPN company Proton VPN reported a peak of 44,000 daily sign-ups at one point amidst censorship concerns.
In a similar context, millions of Russians have turned to VPNs in an effort to bypass state-controlled media reporting on the invasion of neighboring Ukraine, news reports say. This comes as Russian authorities have cracked down on media narratives not towing the official line on the war, according to The Washington Post.
Notably, more than 1,000 internet sites have been restricted by Russian authorities – including Facebook, Instagram, and BBC News – since the conflict began, according to a survey by a VPN technology tracker.
While numerous countries worldwide have also witnessed VPNs gain traction among their citizens, there have been notable crackdowns on the use of VPNs.
According to NordVPN, at least 13 countries have made VPNs illegal to some extent, although the enforcement of these bans is not always clear-cut. Evidently, users have managed to find ways to circumvent the restrictions.
Currently, approximately one-third of the world’s 5 billion internet users have adopted VPN usage, and this figure is expected to rise in the future.
