How to Make Your Own VPN (And Why You Would Want to)

Welcome to the comment section! Please read the FAQ before leaving a comment: Q: How do you know that the VPS doesn’t keep the logs? Isn’t that the same as trusting a VPN service? A: Every Internet gateway can potentially log and monitor your traffic. A VPN (be that a VPN service or a self-hosted VPN) doesn’t give you extra privacy or anonymity and can potentially monitor your activity. Instead, if you need some extra privacy while browsing the Internet, you should use Tor 06:00 As I mentioned in my last video, VPNs should be used to avoid censorship, geoblocks and DMCA letters, but they won’t magically make you more secure and anonymous. Q: Are you only recommending a VPS as a solution because you were sponsored by Linode? A: No. I’ve been using a self-hosted VPN since 2017 and am currently using a VPS from another company. I’ve also been approached by a several VPN companies that offered to sponsor my videos; I politely refused their offers because such sponsorship will go against my point of view on VPN services. Linode is one of the biggest VPS providers on the market and I’m glad they sponsored this video, however you can always choose another VPS to host your VPN: DigitalOcean, Vultr, Hetzner, etc. Q: But doesn’t a self-hosted VPN make you more identifiable since you’re the only user? A: Unlike a VPN service, on a self-hsoted VPN you get a dedicated IP that isn’t shared with any other users. However, a shared IP on a VPN service doesn’t give you more privacy: you still use your real IP to connect to it, and your account has a unique identifiable set of keys. In both cases if a certain government agency were interested in your online activities, it would require requesting logs from the provider, and in case of Linode (or any VPS provider) the authorities would only retrieve connection logs (e.g. when you connected to the VPS from your IP address) – so pretty much the same as with a VPN service. In both cases the authorities can also request logs from the data center providers or hit the service with a FISA warrant if they reside in the US. Q: Is this tutorial only going to work for Linode? A: No, this tutorial applies to any KVM- (and possibly Xen-) based VPS. The only part that’s going to be different is the process of creating an account, which is pretty easy.

Hey, thank you for this. I saw this on google but no one makes a tutorial. Glad I saw this today on my recommendation. Gonna finish this tutorial and will sign up with your link. Thanks again

I certainly hope nobody is getting Linux ISOs from Pirate Bay lol

At age 80 , I listen to you and marvel. As an old Ham operator, that had to buy Tandy, and then type in code we copied out of a monthly fan magazine, then have to spend a few months of searching for mistakes to get the programs to run…it was an adventure alone, to create on our own , the first TTY just for Morse code. No way today, can I learn to code like all you pros do today. So, I guess that I will have to scrimp on some things and afford a good recommended VPN to pay by the month. I treasure my entertainment on video boxes to watch anime and movies, and right now, so many are blocked..as well as there are constant threats that severe prosecution terms are warned just for watching certain sites. So, thanks for providing the info here…but wow…. I am so glad that there are actually youth out there that have learned higher skills than sending emoji on their cell phones and think that is actual communication. All the BEST Tejasmed TX USA

All the YouTube ads being for VPN services is hilarious. Nice video!

i want a vpn that makes my isp think im only watching netflix

I’m a newbie to all things related to coding. I’m learning SQL and Python and how API’s work. But how did you learn about this? Can you give me some pointers on how you learned all this? What books have you read? Do you have any recommendations on where I should start? Warmest regards M

I got an ad on a Vpn called ipvanish and the first words where “The internet is tracking everything you do!”

That comment is hilarious. That person doesn’t know what they’re talking about. Go take a cyber security course at your local community college ahah

“every website with a green padlock” cries in qutebrowser

imagine using openvpn in 2020 this post was made by wireguard gang

I’m a cybersecurity expert with over 1337666 years of experience in the field. HTTPS doesn’t encrypt any data, is just runs it through some math that makes is very difficult for people to sniff out the data going over the connection. It’s not encryption though! (disclaimer: this comment is purely satirical…)

seems pretty dope. was originally just gonna buy a vpn but this seems like a way better option.

that video from Tom Scott is indeed brilliant, I watched it many times for the entertainment value alone

Using password authentication on SSH is encrypted, it’s send over the encrypted SSH tunnel just like any other data to the SSH server. SSH Key authentication is preferred option and provides much better security, against people setting silly easy to crack passwords.

Personally I love the movement for personally owned data like your privacy and files. As an enthusiast with multiple industry grade certifications behind me ranging from general certifications in cyber-security & general networking to Cisco university grade diplomas. I don’t care about my own privacy (I know controversial opinion for my field..) however I stand behind this video in more ways then one, he outlines the benefits to self-hosting your own VPN perfectly. The reason I use VPN’s is to allow much better security within my networks for the company I run. By only allowing OpenVPN’s port past our network firewalls and then encrypting all user profiles substantially it allows me and our employees to access and be on these networks remotely without fear of multiple ports/applications vulnerabilities. Awesome video, love your other content too!

It’s funny seeing downloading legally obtained content turned into linux ISO’s through time hahahahaha lol

“download linux isos” lmaoooooo

How you can be sure that ISP of your server doesnt keep logs of all traffic in dc?

Yeah yeah all the stuff… IS THAT GNOME? (mine was just a joke, I didn’t mean to start a DE war >.<)

Just turn on Tor, turn on nord or Express VPN, run vps And youre secure 😀 *for speed connections only

1:23 i would do the big brain move.. mirror-inverted scene.

I love tutorials (specially since just dry theory isnt that interesting….), so thank you for adding that…

For Mobile Users Timestamps: 00:00 Introduction 00:33 “But I only use VPN for Netflix…” 01:28 Everything wrong with the VPN services 01:49 “Your ISP is spying on you!” 02:27 “Open Wi-Fi networks are dangerous!” 02:39 Military Encryption ™ 03:28 “We will never keep logs or sell your data!” 04:03 PureVPN and Schroedinger’s logs 05:09 PrivateInternetAccess acquisition 05:23 NordVPN 2018 breach 05:50 What are the alternatives? 06:00 Tor 07:25 Self-hosted VPN 07:39 VPN services vs. Self-hosted VPNs 08:58 Choosing a VPS provider 09:18 Virtualisation technology 09:49 Dedicated IPv4 address 10:11 Location 10:43 My choice of the VPS provider 11:25 Creating an account (The tutorial starts here) 11:45 Creating a VPS 12:37 Generating SSH keys 13:46 Updating the packages 14:07 Creating a non-root user 15:04 Configuring SSH 17:14 Installing and configuring OpenVPN 20:50 Installing mosh 21:14 Two-factor authentication 23:53 Automatic updates 25:11 Conclusion

when i load the file on my local PC it gets stuck on “Initialization Sequence Completed”

“Linux ISOs” Good one.

I personally use SoftEther hosted on my vps as my main vpn, while when I want to access something restricted I use VpnGate (which use SoftEther for connections).

Could you make a video on how to make it so i get email notifications whenever i or someone logs into SSH? Subscribed and bought a linode server thanks for tutorial!

0:41 ah yes C O R N H U B home of T O P Q U A L I T Y corn

Somebody ask how does AES, DES, VPN technology secure their data? answer: Intel Management Engine (ME)=wide open for us!

I tried your tutorial step by step, but when I tried to activate my VPN from the settings, it said “Connection Failed. Activation of network connection failed”.

Samy K’s Evercookie can be used to track Tor users and Snowden revealed the NSA uses Evercookie.

Thank you for this great video! While I was following along, an error occurred when I try to use mosh as a replacement of ssh for login: can’t find remote IP address. (is SSH ‘Proxycommand’ disabled?) Where should I enable this option? Also, in “Create an alias for your server” part, should I place the ~/.ssh/config file in my local machine or should I create it after logging into my remote server? Thanks again for this great work!

Thank you for this video WolfGang, I usually rely on typed tutorials but I thought this was so well done that you definitely deserved the full view. Was wondering how you initially got into coding? And how a newcomer may get into it?

Really good tutorial, I was one of the many that viewed the original and thought it good. But this was great and I saved it in my linux folder for those moments I want to set something up like this. And the steps for openvpn and mosh etc was great too thanks!

Thank you. This video was really interesting and insightful. ^^

in turkey government wants to close youtube, twitter, instagram etc… so i am here for making my own vpn.

Man, I wish I had seen this video a month ago. I just renewed my VPN subscription for $99 for a year.

Unfortunately one just needs to read or listen to Edward Snowden to know especially in the US we can be easily observed

Finally someone who talks about VPNs without sponsorship. Thank you!

i really appreciate the amount of effort you put into making this tutorial and showing how serious you are about privacy

And i was wondering what happened to your Sunday streams… Great video, will definitely try self-hosting in the future.

Bruh i got a nordvpn ad while watching

Hella informative, thank you for making this vid.

Joke’s on you i’ve already seen that Tom Scott video

Wonderful guide, thank you Wolfgang! Never heard about mosh and I really liked the tip

Thanks, dude. Just last week, I was wondering how to set up my own VPN. You answered my prayers! Cool beans!

Thank you! this was a great tutorial man! Do you think you could do one for setting up a docker vpn container to use with the newly created VPN?

Thanks for the tutorial, could you give me some guidance on how to set the vpn up on my phone? I’m talking after the server is all set up.

Excellent stuff thanks, wish I knew enough about coding to set one of these up for myself.

Thanks for this video. I especially like that you created a text guide to go with it! You have cleared up a lot of the confusion I had around this topic. Much appreciated!

Damn. This video just reminded me that every authority should be questioned.

@Wolfgang’s Channel Im getting line 1: Bad configuration option: 1 etc after setting up the config file what am i doing wrong?

thanks a lot, you explained probably all the questions that me and my friends have about vpn and privacy.

Holy, this video is a work of art. Good job!

Thank you for your research, time and so forth, $10 a month is starting to get pricey, but I will suspend judgement pending further investigation.

Thank you for this. I set one up that routes to my home network. I have a smb file share set up on a raspberry pi and I wanted access to that. I also am using it to get past my schools firewall

Used Linode several times. Good company. Glad to see it mentioned here.

Analyzing TOR traffic, I just wonder how secure it really is? Especially from NSA and also other members of the sigint/digint “club”? Servers joined in a hop scenario, it seems that several exit servers for ex. in europe is deliberitly blocked in a sophisticated pattern. Where traffic also, most probably also is involved in massive timing analysis. These techniques is especially possible when controlling large backbone networks, directly or indirectly through secret agreements.

Great video, just wish I understood it more so I could give it a go!

Great video. Might try this out myself, if only to learn working with lunx and servers in gerneral. Would be interesting to see a video about your linux configuration and programs you are using because I really like its look and usefulness.

Nice video! Looking forward to part 2 (did this comment for the algorithm )

That said, I think it would be very helpful if you could please include links to all the documents and web information that you reference in your videos. There are people such as myself that are interested in not only verifying your claims (and anyone else’s for that matter) but also learning more about these issues. I strongly feel that it would add more credibility to whatever case you make much in the way that references and citations do for an academic paper. Other than sharing my one request I have no more to say than thank you for all our work in bringing these topics to our attention.

Great video! Thanks for sharing the knowledge.

This video covers many things i was looking for. Amazing video! Keep it up. Just a question, once you setup a server, are you able to use netflix or you need a special configuration to do that ?

Before this video I watched NordVPN ad xD

i really like to create my own vpn but i dont know some configuration/formula but knowing this is so cool

Oh god. Just the moment you said: “I know you guys are lazy” and then explained the other video yourself

Watching this thanks to Brazil’s new law

I was looking for Hello World 🙁

I just clicked to watch your video and the first ad that i saw was for a VPN service. oh and the second one too.

Good to know the VPN i subscribe to was bought out by spooky Israli’s – thanks for the heads up Wolfgang – it may be time to consider a change of providers.