Don't Get Pwned on Public WiFi: Use Your Own VPN
I use a VPN for much of my private traffic. Here is where I differ from the article's recommendations, and why:<p>- I don't recommend rolling your own on EC2: pick a VPN with a good reputation and a policy of not retaining logs. See: <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-services-that-take-your-anonymity-seriously-2013-edition-130302/" rel="nofollow">http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-services-that-take-your-anonymit...</a> (you don't have to use torrents to need a VPN, btw!!)<p>- I recommend using a Debian VM w/ OpenVPN for your private traffic. That way, 'am I using my VM?' is a quick test for whether your traffic is private or public.<p>- I can't stress this enough: _be sure to firewall your VM from any traffic not to your VPN provider_. <i></i>If OpenVPN drops its connection, it will fallback to sending packets normally!<i></i> At least if you firewall, your connection will just die, instead of potentially sending private traffic in the clear. The article doesn't mention this, and it should.<p>- Be sure not to log in to your usual services on your VPN, or there is a possibility that someone can connect your real traffic and your VPN traffic. I use LastPass with random passwords to manage all of my accounts, so I solve this problem by simply not installing LastPass on my VM, which makes logging in a very deliberate action on my VM.