What Are The Best VPN Alternatives for Journalists?

If you’re a journalist, chances are you’ll use a VPN at some point.

Virtual private networks, or VPNs for short, give you online privacy and anonymity by sending your web traffic through an encrypted tunnel to a server controlled by the VPN company. VPNs effectively conceal your internet protocol (IP) address, making your online activity untraceable. Using one makes it more difficult for internet service providers (ISPs) to identify users and block their internet access. That’s why VPNs are the preferred method to access the internet for journalists and others on the go who want to enjoy secure and encrypted internet connections that offer more privacy than secured Wi-Fi hotspots.

In the event of a targeted throttling or partial shutdown, VPNs come in handy because they can bypass a block of IP addresses in a particular location or country. They’re indispensable tools for journalists at the mercy of governments that might try to block internet and social media access in an effort to curtail and control information about significant events such as civil and social unrest.

Consider the following anecdote from Gabrielle Mitch, a freelance journalist based in Lubumbashi, Congo, who spoke to the International Journalists’ Network (IJN) in 2019. Mitch recalled having to contend with internet outages in the country during the 2018 presidential elections. She described having to run between different locations to find reliable internet access.

“Meanwhile, a Zambian radio [station] called Phoenix, which I also reported for regarding elections, could not reach me. I was in distress. I went to a friend’s office whose internet provider was based abroad but the government also cut the internet by giving an ultimatum to the provider,” she said.

She added: “You had to buy Postpaid Flybox internet from local operators which costs between US$300 and US$500. Some fortunate journalists had the luxury of working in luxurious hotels that had Postpaid Flybox but social networks were still not working.”

But not all VPNs are made equal and digital security specialists recommend that you conduct adequate research because there have been cases where the VPNs journalists downloaded were in fact run by governments.

Below are some suggestions for your perusal.

ZERO TRUST NETWORK ACCESS (ZTNA)

ZTNA gives users access to the internet via an encrypted tunnel that hides their IP address, much like a VPN. But unlike VPNs, ZTNA denies complete access to a local area network, or LAN, only providing access to services the user has been granted. ZTNA technologies benefit larger corporations with many users and help prevent cybercriminals from gaining access, which is available to users who have been authenticated to the ZTNA service. ZTNA operates on a zero-trust security principle, which means that attackers who have managed to access the network run into more hurdles before they can infiltrate other areas.

LANTERN

Lantern is a peer-to-peer internet censorship circumvention tool that can bypass filtration sanctioned by a state. Lantern, which is open-source, becomes active when users attempt to access blocked websites. Users receive access to these blocked websites because Lantern routes users through its servers or the services of volunteers. Lantern is not the best option where internet privacy and anonymity are concerned because it collects information about users’ background and browser behavior.

TOR

Tor enables anonymous communication, allowing users to bypass social media and internet blockages. When using Tor, internet traffic is directed through a volunteer overlay network to make communications difficult for anyone performing network surveillance or traffic analysis to trace. In the event of a targeted throttling or partial shutdown, a Tor user’s location will be unknown and they can still use the internet, flouting any state sanctioned censorship.

SMART DNS

Smart DNS is technology that allows users to conceal their actual location by routing their Domain Name Server (DNS) requests to a server in a different country altogether. Many people use it to gain access to content that is georestricted, such as streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, and others. But more importantly, it’s a great tool for a journalist to have in their back pocket. Internet connection speeds are also slightly higher when using Smart DNS than when using VPNs because it reroutes information about your location through a different location. Unlike proxy web servers, Smart DNS does not hide your IP address or encrypt your web data, so it’s not a good option for those who want to increase both their security and privacy.