Fundamentally, a VPN provides two services: #1: Encrypting all your data traffic, between two points...your client computer/mobile-device and whatever website that you are using/viewing More importantly: #2: It hides your computer/devices's normal IP-address, (from which your geographic location and other identifiying information can be captured).
Your normal IP-address will typially get assigned to your device by your 'Internet Service Provider [ISP], (such as Comcast/XFinity). But, during a VPN-protected session, a generic/temporary IP-address gets assigned instead... one that contains generic 'identity/location' info for some random server at the other end of the tunnel, which will likely be some far-off country. The key point is that this connection will NOT be traceable back to you.
Stated another way...if your IP-address is NOT being hidden/changed, then any computer capable of monitoring your computer traffic (including your ISP themselves!) can examine each piece of data that goes in or out. Thus, they can determine the precise name and location of a file you are downloading or content that you are watching at the moment, or whatever.
Most true VPNs charge a monthly fee for their service. For that fee, their VPN service will encrypt/protect ALL Internet traffic in and out of your computer/device...no matter which software programs or browsers are engaged in network communication. Whereas free VPN software gets installed 'INSIDE' one specific browser that you choose and thus it is encrypting ONLY the web traffic to/from that one specific browser. (Such a VPN is referred to as a "proxy server" and is typically implemented as a so-called 'browser-extension'.)
Full VPNs typically cost at least $10 per month, whereas most proxy-server browser-based VPNs are free.
So, before we bother to explain all the intricasies of choosing downloading, and installing, etc some proxy-server VPN for the Chrome-browser or the Firefox-browser, or whatever, I suggest you first install the Opera-browser, enable its builtin VPN, and play around and get familiar with using such a VPN.
They say "a picture is worth a thousand words'...so, let's do a "before / after" experiment. BEFORE you enable the VPN inside of Opera, use Opera browser to navigate to the special . IpLocation website here ( Once you're there, do NOT click on any of the page/s buttons, and do NOT signup, etc. We are using this page strictly as INFORMATIONAL. So, scroll down a bit, until you see a table of 10 or 11 entries, under the heading "IP Address Details". The only two entries we really care about are labeled "IP Location" and "ISP" (Internet Service Provider). In my case, for "IP Location", I see "Manchester NH" (which is the city in which I presently reside). And, for "ISP", I see "Comcast Cable Communications LLC" (which is, in fact, the company that I pay each month for my Internet service.
Now, go into the Opera browser's settings and browse/scroll around in there, and ENABLE Opera's builtin VPN. Then, repeat your visit to this IpLocation website page above, and you should NOW see the two new values of interest: For "IP Location", I happen to now see "Ashburn, Virgina" and for ""ISP" I see "Opera Software AS". And, of course the actual numeric value of "IPv4 Address" or "IPv6 Address" has been over-ridden/changed.
You first need to learn how to setup, say, a 'Windows-10' Chrome-browser-based VPN, so that you can enable and disable it as desired. Note: Our goal, as before, is to hide the IP-address for all of that browser's tabs (including, say, the browser-extension named "jsTorrent", which is used for torrent downloading from any of the popular torrent-based websites) so that you are using a 'hidden' IP-address for all that tab's traffic..
Ok...this setup is actually quite straight-forward to do.
Here's a basic article explaining VPNs
It's a good idea to leave your VPN disabled, except when you actually needing it's protection. Thus, any time, just before you're ready to actually BEGIN doing a torrent-download, or to BEGIN viewing your favorite'explicit' website , you must first remember to manually go enable your browser's VPN, and when you're done, disable it. [ In other words, the lion's share of your daily Chrome-browser usage should be done with your VPN disabled. That said, however, one COULD just enable the VPN once and leave it enabled all the time. A warning tho: the PROBLEM with that, is that you'll usually experience very slow performance in that browser]
So let's assume you have installed and setup a Chrome-browser-based VPN extension: (The one named "Browsec", is the the VPN I use, which is available at the Chrome webstore. We will now, go thru the details, and download, install, and enable the BROWSEC VPN, by simply clicking on the round-silver-grid-world logo for BROWSEC. [ The first-time using it, you can/should pin it to the right end of Google Chrome's address bar. So now click on that BROWSEC icon. It's dialog popup has a clickable 'slide-switch.' When clicked into the ON position, it should have a list-box of various country-name choices, of various countrys' VPN-servers that you wish to use. I typically just use the default choice of the Netherlands. ]
So, use this method: (1) Enable your Browsec VPN. (2) Navigate to a torrent-site using Chrome, and search for and choose the video's torrent/magnet link that you want to download. When you click on your chosen file, iit will now visibly launch JSTorrent, in behalf of this browser instance. So, now you have JSTorrent's torrent stream downloading through the VPN/tunnel!
To become familiar with STARTING and STOPPING the 'Browsec VPN Service', and TESTING that it's operating as expected, create yourself a browser bookmark that points that IPlocation informational webpage mentioned above.
One last note/hint: I frequently forget to enable and then disable the browser's VPN. So, a convenient workaround for that is to use some browser OTHER than Opera as your every-day everything-else browser (e.g. Chrome or Firefox or whatever), and leave the Opera browser's VPN always enabled, and then use Opera anytime you want to run under the protection of a VPN.