What is a Double VPN?

3 min

There’s no way to be 100% protected online. If you use the internet in any form, say to surf the web or use social networking sites, you are vulnerable to cyberattacks, tracking, and privacy invasion. A VPN is therefore an essential companion for anyone who is connected to the internet.

If you use a VPN to secure your connections both at home and on public networks, you are more protected than the average internet user. But what if you want more web protection?

What if you’re a journalist and want to avoid government surveillance at any cost? What if your field of work demands more preventive care? What option do you have other than a VPN?

Well, that’s what a double VPN or VPN chaining is for.

Let’s take a look at what a double VPN is and how it can help you enhance your web security.

What is a Double VPN?

A double VPN is a setup where a network connection is tunneled twice. Instead of using a single remote server to route the connection (as in traditional “single” VPNs), a double VPN makes use of two different servers. This naturally encrypts the connection twice.

Here’s how a double VPN works: after switching on a VPN, your connection is encrypted and routed through a server. Here the connection is re-encrypted and forwarded to another distant server. The connection is finally decrypted and passed to your destination.

This double tunneling provides a stronger cover to your connection both in terms of encryption and routing. While breaking open a VPN tunnel itself is a gargantuan task, an attacker will now need to break open two layers of encryption too. This is how a double VPN enhances the overall protection; by making it difficult for an attacker or snooper to break open the tunnels and access your web traffic.

The major disadvantage of double VPNs is high latency. Since connections are routed through two separate servers – that may be closer or farther from each other – you’ll experience considerable speed throttling in your connection. VPNs already get a lot of flak for speed throttling, so even more impact has likely resulted in muted general interest in double VPNs.

That doesn’t mean double VPN has no takers, though.

Who Needs a Double VPN?

Double VPNs are mostly intended for the following user groups:

  • Journalists, activists, whistleblowers
  • Individuals working for national defense
  • Government agents
  • General netizens who want to avoid government surveillance

If you’re a home user, you’re better off using a single VPN. As long as you are continuously connected to a reliable VPN, you’re good.

How to Set Up Double VPN?

Double VPN is usually offered as a special feature by VPN providers. However, you can set up a double VPN using two different VPN clients. 

The most common way to set up a double VPN is to install separate VPN apps on both your Wi-Fi router and devices. For example, you can install a VPN on your smartphone and another VPN on your wireless router. Now connect your smartphone to the network offered by the router and then switch on the VPN on your smartphone. 

Whenever you connect your devices to this Wi-Fi network, you’ll effectively get double VPN protection. Just make sure to use separate VPN companies for the best performance.

As you can guess, such a double VPN setup will throttle the speed of your connection to a great extent. Therefore, you’ll need to decide if you are okay with trading speed for more privacy protection.

The concept of double VPN is not new. There have been used cases and real-life applications of features such as multi-hopping and VPN layering. All of them mean the same thing. The only difference between these variations is that a double VPN uses only two servers. Other types of setups may use more than two.

Feels like a double VPN might be overkill. Continue using tuxlerVPN to stay protected from the perils of the internet.

BackNext article