A VPN is a great way to secure your internet traffic by masking your IP through heavy-duty encryption. A lot of people use VPN to access game betas, hide traffic from ISPs, access website content behind government firewalls (like in China), or protect themselves from malicious attackers and hackers.

A VPN is a powerful tool with many benefits, but when people find out that they might need one just to do something else they want to do, their first reaction is always: is it free? As in the case of many things–“free” isn’t always a good thing, and when considering free VPNS, it’s an actually an appalling thing.

Take Hola VPN for example. It is one of the most popular VPN services around, with over 47 million active users around the globe using their VPN services to change their IP address. Unfortunately, Hola VPN was caught converting their own user’s computers into miniature proxy servers. Many of these free users were un-knowingly renting their own bandwidth to the highest bidder.

A premium VPN service like TorGuard uses individual remote servers that are maintained and controlled by TorGuard itself. When a user connects to the remote server, they are given a special IP address that is shared with other users on the TorGuard VPN network to provide more anonymity. All data flowing through the VPN tunnel is encrypted, and you can choose from multiple servers around the world. Free VPN services might allow you to access unrestricted content but at what price? Well, turns out a significant one! Free VPN services like Hola was also found to be selling bandwidth collected from its user base. Users became, and still are, part of an enormous botnet that involves renting out bandwidth to those who paid.

As in the case of Hola, free VPNs are always out to make a profit, whether through channels associated with selling your data out to marketing firms to target ads, installing ads into your connection, or allocating your bandwidth around for money. If you truly value privacy, you’re better off not even using a VPN than a free one.

VPNs bandwidth doesn’t grow on trees. In fact, running a reliable VPN requires an extremely influential business with powerful servers located all around the world. TorGuard uses state of the art encryption, maintains a strict no logging policy, offers 24/7 customer service staff, and a plethora of other valuable features that make the service worth using.

Take TorGuard or example. It gives its users access to over 1200 servers over 42+ locations, 24/7 365 days a year support, multiple app and proxy offerings across every platform–like iOS and Android apps, Chrome and Firefox extensions, Stealth VPN and more. It has an enormous commitment to privacy and encryption.

No one cares more about privacy than the staff here at TorGuard VPN. So next time you’re considering a free VPN, the small prices associated with purchasing a cheap VPN plan will greatly outweigh sacrificing your personal privacy.