University students with laptops studying in the library.  Image: Getty/Klaus Vedfelt The number of ransomware attacks against schools and universities is on the rise – and victims are struggling to recover after their networks have been hit. According to analysis by cybersecurity researchers at Sophos, education is facing an increased challenge from the threat of […] More

(Image: Shutterstock)Private Internet Access is a powerful, flexible VPN that does a good job of keeping your data and location safe.

Servers: 29,311Countries: 78Simultaneous connections: 10Kill switch: yesLogging: noBest deal: $2.19/mo or $79 for three yearsTrial: 7-day free trial and 30-day refund guaranteeSupported platforms: iOS, Android, MacOS, Windows, Linux

Definitely read through the details below. There’s a lot to like with this product, and the price is good as well as the performance. Just don’t try using it to connect to India. Read on, and you’ll see those results as well. Ugh.Initiating a connectionInitiating a connection with Private Internet Access (PIA) was quite straightforward. I’m going to demonstrate this on Windows, but the interfaces are somewhat similar for Mac, iOS, and Android.Upon install, an app was placed in the system tray. As you can see, starting with the default connection is a matter of just pressing the amber power button:There’s a lot you can do from this interface, even before initiating a connection. For example, you can choose what server you want to use for your connection. You can get to that list by clicking on the greater-than sign to the right of the pre-selected server location. Special featuresPIA offers a good selection of extra features and options. You can get to this by right-clicking on the tray icon or tapping the three-dot menu at the upper right and then selecting Settings. The General preferences are relatively straightforward. You can decide whether to launch on startup and connect on launch, plus there are a few appearance options. I prefer the dark theme.Anti-malware and tracker disablingThe Account tab simply reflects your account and plan data. But the Privacy tab is interesting. Here you can enable the VPN kill switch as well as MACE, PIA’s anti-malware and tracking feature. Split-tunnelling

A very useful feature is the comprehensive split-tunneling feature PIA offers. As you can see, you can choose whether to use the VPN or not based on both applications and IP addresses. This is powerful, for example, if you must visit a site or service without using the PIA VPN. Some banks won’t allow access if they detect you’re using a VPN. Another benefit is that you could use the PIA VPN for personal surfing, and then if you use the corporate VPN app, you could turn off PIA, so you’re on your company’s provided connection.Protocol choicePIA protocol choice is somewhat limited, giving you the option of OpenVPN or WireGuard. Honestly, both are quite good, so we have no complaints that some of the older, weaker, and fussier protocols aren’t provided. I’m showing OpenVPN selected here, but all the testing we will do later will be with the often-faster WireGuard, a more modern protocol for this type of application.Connection automationPIA’s connection automation feature is interesting, but I do wish it was more feature-rich. As it stands, you can configure PIA to automatically connect or disconnect based on whether you’re connected to an open Wi-Fi channel, an encrypted Wi-Fi link, or a wired connection.That’s all well and good, but we’d like to see the ability to turn on and off the malware environment based on a connection, modify which apps use the VPN connection, and change settings based on IP address or block of IP address. That way, for example, when you bring your laptop to work, one full set of profiles would activate. When you’re at home, another set might activate, and so on. This is a good first step, but it’s an area where PIA can certainly benefit from additional work.Dedicated IPFinally, you can choose to upgrade your account with one or more dedicated IP addresses. Dedicated IP addresses are available for connections via the US, Australia, Canada, Germany, and the UK. The additional cost is $5/mo per dedicated IP address purchased. That IP remains yours throughout the duration of your dedicated IP subscription.Performance and leak testingI installed the Private Internet Access application on a fresh, fully-updated Windows 10 install. I always use a fresh install to do this kind of testing, so some other company’s VPN leftovers aren’t clogging up the system and possibly influencing results. I have a 1GB fiber feed, so my baseline network speed is rockin’ fast.

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To provide a fair US performance comparison, rather than comparing to my local fiber broadband provider, I used speedtest.net and picked a Comcast server in Chicago to test download speed.For each test, I connected to each server three times. The number shown below is the average result of the three connections.In looking at these numbers, it’s possible to get carried away by the difference in the baseline speed compared to the VPN speed. That’s not the best measurement, mostly because I have broadband over fiber, so my connection speed is extremely high.Also, if you look at the baseline speeds between my reviews, you may notice that they differ considerably going to the same cities. Keep in mind that speed tests are entirely dependent on the performance of all the links between the two locations, including the time of day, how active those servers are, and how slow or fast the Internet is on a given day.I used to commute to work from Berkeley to Mountain View in Silicon Valley. At midnight, that was a 35-minute drive. During rush hour, it was a two-hour drive. The same kinds of traffic jams can hit the Internet. All this is to go to the recommendation I have in all my reviews; test for yourself. More on that later.

Beyond the US, I tested connections to Sweden, Taiwan, Australia, and India. For each test, I connected to each server three times. The number shown below is the average result of all three connections. I could not test a connection to Russia because PIA doesn’t appear to have a Russian presence.While I was connected, I also ran DNS and WebRTC leak tests (to make sure that DNS and IP are secure) using DNSLeak.com, ipleak.net, and dnsleaktest.com. These tests are basic security tests and not much more. If you’re planning on using NordVPN (or any VPN service) to hide your identity for life and death reasons, be sure to do far more extensive testing.Here are the results of my tests:Speed Test ServerBaseline download speed without VPN (higher is better)Ping speed without VPN (lower is better)Time to connect to VPNDownload speed with VPN (higher is better)Ping speed with VPN (lower is better)LeaksChicago – Comcast236.97Mbps59ms3 sec77.43Mbps61msNoStockholm, Sweden – SUNET151.37Mbps178ms4 sec65.95Mbps164msNoTaipei, Taiwan – TAIFO240.64Mbps148ms5 sec81.17Mbps232msNoPerth, Australia – Optus246.79Mbps230ms5 sec100.80Mbps193msNoHyderabad, India – I-ON170.66Mbps248ms5 sec0.67Mbps276msNo66.Mumbai, India – Sky Broadband66.83Mbps247ms5 sec1.92Mbps1,128msNoIn looking at these numbers, it’s possible to get carried away by the difference in the baseline speed compared to the VPN speed. That’s not the best measurement, mostly because I have broadband over fiber, so my connection speed is extremely high.There’s a little too much promo here for me to feel comfortable.When you use a VPN service, it’s natural for performance to drop. After all, you’re running all your packets through an entirely artificial infrastructure designed to hide your path. The real numbers you should look at are the download speed and the ping speed. Are they high enough to do the work you need to do?Ping speed is an indication of how quickly a response gets back after a network request is sent from your computer. Some of the limitations here are due to actual physics. If you’re sending a packet across the planet, it will take longer to hear back than if you’re sending a packet across town.The leak tests were interesting in that they showed no leaks whatsoever. The only thing that slightly concerned me was that dnsleak.com was plastered with promotions for Private Internet Access. Since the other sites reported the same leak-free results, I’m comfortable passing it along. It just seemed to embed the PIA promotions too tightly into the test results.For all connections, with the exception of India, PIA download performance was quite good. Since you don’t really need more than about 6Mbps to 8Mbps to stream HD video from sites like YouTube, the PIA connections were certainly fast enough. For years, most of us would have been thrilled to have the broadband download speeds reported after this VPN was enabled.Then there’s India. My non-VPN performance was adequate. Yet, my VPN performance was terrible. I first tried a Hyderabad connection, and the resulting 0.69Mbps was essentially unusable. Connecting to Mumbai resulted in barely better results. I retried these tests six times each, and they were consistently terrible. The only bright side to the India tests is that other VPNs I tested, most notably NordVPN, also had abysmal VPN results, so PIA isn’t alone in this performance phenomenon.The bottom line of my basic performance tests is that you can clearly get the job done unless it involves India. If you have a specific country you want to connect to, it’s a good idea to take advantage of the company’s full 30-day refund policy and just try it out.The bottom lineThere are three really important things to know when choosing a VPN:Does it log any of your data?Does it hide you while online?Is it fast enough to get done what you need to get done?I can’t independently verify the first question, but PIA does say they don’t log any data. That question is probably the hardest to answer definitively because few of the VPN vendors we’ve looked at have independent audits to verify their claims.As for the second question, PIA does hide your data, it does hide your originating location, and it appears to hide the fact that you’re using a VPN. That’s a solid result.As for the third question, for the locations I was able to test (with the exception of India), the answer is a clear “yes.” You can easily move files, stream YouTube, and do all your basic work while active VPN connection. It might be faster to walk there if you’re trying to connect to India, at least from the Pacific Northwest in the United States.Overall, though, I was quite impressed with PIA. At $2.19 per month for three years, it’s one of the more inexpensive plans we’ve looked at, and yet it’s very full-featured. We liked the setup and configuration options, although seeing the automations turn into full-on profiles would be nice. We also like that PIA offers its client software in open source on Github.As always, I recommend you take advantage of PIA’s 30-day money-back guarantee and give it a complete test. The only way you can truly know if it’ll work for you is if you put it to work and find out for yourself.

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Billion-dollar logistics firm Hellmann Worldwide Logistics reported a cyberattack this week that forced them to temporarily remove all connections to their central data center. The company said the shut down was having a “material impact” on their business operations. 

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The German company operates in 173 countries, running logistics for a range of air and sea freights as well as rail and road transportation services. Air Cargo News, which first reported the attack, said the company had a revenue of nearly $3 billion last year.In a statement, Hellmann said its Global Crisis Taskforce discovered the attack but outside cybersecurity experts were brought in to help with the response. “Operations will be restored step by step, with the security and integrity of the systems as the top priority,” reads the statement.The statement does not say if they were suffering from a ransomware attack, and the company did not respond to requests for comment. This is a particularly inopportune time for a global logistics firm like Hellmann to suffer from a cyberattack considering the role it plays in the global supply chain, explained Nasser Fattah, North America steering committee chair at Shared Assessments.  “Today, the movement of goods is a global process that requires a concerted effort because the supply chain may include transportation, shipping, receiving, storage, and management of goods,” Fattah said. 

“The slightest kink in the chain can cause the business to suffer simply because of untimely deliveries. And businesses know that implementing seamless logistics is essential to keep pace with customer demands and remain competitive.” More

The US Department of the Interior (DOI) has halted the operations of its entire drone fleet except in emergency situations as the department wants to review whether the drones manufactured by “designated foreign-owned companies” are a threat to national security.  In an order [PDF] signed on Wednesday by US Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt, […] More

Do you use a password manager? As far as I’m concerned, it’s the single most important security precaution you can take, regardless of which hardware platforms you favor. (If you want to read my full case for why everyone should adopt this security measure, see this explainer: “Forgot password? Five reasons why you need a password manager.”)
The biggest advantage of a good password manager is that it allows you to create and save a unique, impossible-to-guess password for every online service you use. That collection of passwords is stored in an encrypted database that only you can unlock, and with your permission that database can be synced, securely, to every Windows PC, Mac, and mobile device you own.
I’ve tried a lot of password managers over the years, and there are some worthy contenders in this category. (For a full list of options, see “The best password managers for business: 1Password, Keeper, LastPass, and more.”) My favorite, and the one I enthusiastically recommend to friends, family, and co-workers, is 1Password. I ignored this program for years because it catered mainly to Mac owners. That might have been true years ago, but today, this is hands down the best cross-platform password manager solution.

My favorite password manager has it all. It works on every desktop and mobile hardware platform. It has every feature you expect from this class of software, including a robust password generator that can create and save truly random, unguessable credentials, as well as support for two-factor authentication. And it offers sync options to satisfy even the most skeptical among us.
Pricing: 1Password is a subscription product that is sold in personal and business editions. The personal options cost $36/year for a single user (on as many devices as you want) or $60/year for a family plan that supports up to five people. Business plans include a $4/month Teams option and an $8/month Business option that includes additional security features and a free Family plan for every licensed user. Enterprise customers can call for a custom quote.
View Now at iPassword
Toronto-based 1Password was founded 15 years ago, in 2005, and has built up a steady, profitable business in that time. But that didn’t stop the company from taking $200 million of series A capital in 2019 to expand into new markets.
So far, that plan has been working out extremely well.
The number-one reason why I love this app is its dead-simple usability. It’s one of the first programs I install when I set up a new Windows 10 PC or a Mac. It’s also a must-install app on iOS and Android devices. (There’s even a command-line version, if you want to incorporate authentication into scripts.) Regardless of platform, 1Password is uncannily accurate at filling in saved passwords, especially on sites with multi-step authentication flows and two-factor authentication. That was a particularly annoying pain point with other password managers I’ve used through the years.
The other killer feature is the ability to create shared password databases (1Password calls them “vaults”). In my family, we have separate password vaults for personal accounts, but the saved credentials for shared subscriptions and shopping accounts go into a shared vault. When my wife wants to check up on the status of an order I placed online, she doesn’t need to ask me to log in and check for her. She can do it herself from her Windows 10 PC or her iPhone, using the saved password from our shared vault.

One of the most controversial aspects of any password manager program is the ability to sync from the cloud, a feature that neatly balances convenience and security.  If you choose the option to store your data on 1Password’s servers, you get some extremely robust security. All data is encrypted at rest and in transit, and connecting a new device requires that you enter your private 128-bit secret key plus a master password that only you know. If you’re still nervous, you can add two-factor authentication. (I’ve configured our family account to accept the Microsoft Authenticator app or one of two hardware keys as a second factor for authentication.)

You can configure 1Password to alert you when a site supports 2-factor authentication.
But if the word cloud makes you start to itch uncontrollably, that’s not a problem. For those who are nervous about storing an encrypted password cache on 1Password’s servers, you have options: You can choose to store the database using Dropbox or iCloud instead, protected by the security features of those platforms. If you prefer the no-cloud option, you’re covered. You can sync passwords between devices on your local network only. In that configuration, 1Password never has access to your encrypted password database, and it can’t be hacked from some obscure Eastern European location.
My favorite recent addition to the 1Password feature set is the ability to generate two-factor authentication (2FA) codes. Previously, I had to rely on a separate authenticator app to handle that chore. (For details, see “Protect yourself: How to choose the right two-factor authenticator app.”)
I can’t emphasize enough how easy 1Password is to use, especially on mobile devices. If you’re flummoxed by passwords, this could be your savior.
Alternatives
If you’re looking for an alternative to 1Password, I recommend these options:
Keeper In my tests, this service was incredibly close to 1Password in terms of usability, and their enterprise story is compelling. It has a full suite of superb cross-platform apps and technical support is first-rate. Put this one on your shortlist if you’re looking for a business-focused password manager.
LastPass  I used this app for years and left, reluctantly, after a security breach shattered my confidence in the company. They’ve since been purchased by the owners of LogMeIn, and the company seems none the worse for wear. More