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A 14-Year-Old Asks: When Should I Get a VPN?

Posted by EditorDavid on from the privacy-starts-young dept.

"One of my students sent me this letter," writes Slashdot reader Hasaf. "I have a good idea how I will answer, but I wanted to put it before the Slashdot community." The letter reads: Right now I am 14 years old, I was wondering when I should get a VPN... I was thinking about getting the yearly deal. But right now I really have no need for a VPN at the moment. I was thinking of getting a VPN when I'm in 11th grade or maybe in college. What do you think?
Of course, the larger question is what factors go into deciding whether your need to be using a VPN. So leave your best answers in the comments. When should you get your first VPN?

5 of 203 comments (clear)

  1. Requirements first. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Let's take a requirements-centric approach:

    What do you need?

    right now I really have no need for a VPN at the moment

    Congratulations! You don't need a VPN, so don't get one yet.

  2. Anytime by dreamchaser · · Score: 5, Insightful

    As long as the parents have man in the middle access it is not a bad idea. Before the kids all flame me for saying that, I saved my daughter from a potential predator because I monitored her Internet use when she was 14.

    At that age one is still a child and still tends to have poor judgement. I know I did back then.

  3. Think carefully how you set it up by Alain+Williams · · Score: 3, Insightful

    if your laptop/phone can connect into your home VPN, then what you carry with you, maybe in another country, could be inspected by border-police/... and they would have access to your home network from their country. Do you want that ? Making things easy for you will also make things easier for people who you might not like.

  4. Re:this is a troll post right? by swb · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The problem with 14 year-olds is that while they're smart enough to know the words, they don't really know the music. We mistake their verbalization of intellectual concepts as understanding.

  5. Re:Ah, that question by Sad+Loser · · Score: 3, Insightful

    So while I think that might be overkill, maybe it is simpler than my solution:

    Main Browser
    Firefox browser with random agent spoofer, noscript, privacy badger and adnauseam so that I am actively obfuscating tracking.

    Secondary Browser
    Secondary browser (chrome) that I use to book tickets, use web outlook or do anything that the main browser will sometimes break.

    Tertiary browser
    Use Torbrowser on the rare occassion that you really don't want to be tracked.

    --
    Humorous signatures are over-rated.