Act of Dog
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Tuesday, September 20, 2005

I'm using Google Secure Access. Should I be scared?

I read with excitement all the hoopla about Google and free wifi access. Well, the hoopla is just that. There is no free wifi access, save a gym and a bus stop or some such over near the Google campus. Not to say that they aren't working on it. It's just not near reality yet. However, they are offering free VPN. I downloaded and installed it. It's working smoothly. I'm a little nervous.

So, what the heck is Google Secure Access? It's simply a little VPN client that connects to Google's servers. If you work for a living and your work involves the use of a computer, you are probably already familiar with the concept of a VPN. Basically, Google Secure Access sets up a secure connection between my machine and Google. It encrypts all the bits and passes them back and forth between me and the servers I request data from. It makes every connection more secure so that bandits out there can't steal my info. This is especially important if, like me, you use wifi all the time.

So, why am I a little scared? Well, by using Google as a VPN, every single little bit of data that passes from me to the Internet and back is going through Google's servers. Some speculate that Google is using this data to learn even more about people's browsing habits. Still, I'd rather take the miniscule risk with Google VPN than the bigger risk of sending bits over the wire unprotected.