Using IPredator

I have been using the IPredator VPN system for about a year. This post is based on my experiences. I will add to it if anything else occurs to me.

The IPredator website is here.

You pay 15 euros for three months.  If you want to continue using IPredator you have to go the website every three months and pay again. I like that there is no automatic renewal.

There is no software to download. You just use the VPN capability built into Windows and Mac OS X. I have set up IPredator under Windows XP, Windows 7 and Mac OS X. The setup instructions on the IPredator website are good. You can set up the IPredator VPN on multiple machines but you can only use it on one machine at a time.

Why use IPredator?

• Traffic through your ISP is encrypted. If you do not know why that might be a good idea you are not going to be an IPredator customer.     BTW - If you do not want your ISP seeing where you are browsing from your DNS calls you also might want to use Open DNS (208.67.222.222 or 208.67.220.220) or Google DNS (8.8.8.8 or 8.8.4.4) instead of your ISP's DNS server.
• Any website that you visit can only log you as coming from the IPredator IP address, they cannot see your real IP address. I have done some simple security tests and IPredator does seem to mask your real IP.  I have not read anything on the net which suggests it has a major security problem other than the requirement to disable IP v6 to prevent your real IP leaking. Simple instructions on doing that are here. It is easy to do and does not appear to affect performance. However, that approach may not be enough and it may be necessary to follow the riskier instructions here. I have not done that yet. I suspect it would not be easy for a nosey person to exploit the IP v6 weakness, so most websites are probably safe enough.

The VPN connects first time on about 60% of occasions. Otherwise, it can take two, three or four attempts. This is  annoying.

I have not been able to connect to any Wordpress blogs [and a few other sites] whilst using IPredator.  I have found one site that has blocked the IPredator IP range because of bad behaviour by other IPredator users.

Downloads via IPredator are a bit slower than with a direct connection, but not significantly so [I am in the EU and therefor near the servers]. I have not found speed an issue. It gets a bit slower in the evening when US users come online.

Sometimes the IPredator VPN connection drops in midstream, exposing your real IP address. This is not frequent, but I have had it happen several times. It is clearly a big issue and should not be happening.

IPredator are a bit shy about saying who they are. Are they legitimate or a honeytrap? I don't know and they are not saying. Their customer service is abysmal. They need to improve their communication with users. iPredator has a blog but it is blank.


Update  May 2011

The service improved for a while [maybe because of this] but has now badly deteriorated [for me].  It is slightly easier to log on but the service is much slower. In fact, for me, it is too slow to be usable. I am also still getting dropped connections which expose my IP address. That rather defeats the purpose of the entire process. I have no idea why iPredator is providing such a poor service and since their customer service is non existent I have no way of finding out what is wrong. The general impression is that the VPN is provided by a bunch of could not care less kids.

If iPredator does not improve a lot in the near future I am going to move to another VPN. This article mentions several.