Where the heck is Bulgaria, and why do you need a Bulgarian IP address?

Bulgaria is one of the oldest countries in Europe. It lies on the western shore of the Black Sea just north of Turkey. Bulgaria is a cultural melting pot with Greek, Slavic, Ottoman, and Persian influences. Once a part of the Soviet Bloc, Bulgaria has gradually moved to a constitutional government and is now a member of NATO and the European Union.

You don’t have to travel 6,000 miles to log into Bulgarian commercial and entertainment sites like BNT1 and BNT2. Also, the Bulgarian torrent website Zamunda.net is one of the world’s largest torrent websites. All you need is to get a Bulgarian VPN to access local Bulgarian services.

On the other hand, there are internal data privacy, freedom of the press, and censorship issues that the country is working out as it transitions from the old totalitarian regime to the EU standards of freedom and privacy protection. It is also illegal in Bulgaria to download torrented files of copyrighted material. While enforcement is somewhat lax, it is best to use a VPN server while web browsing and Bulgaria.

How a VPN works

When you log on to a VPN in Bulgaria, you add an encrypted layer to your internet connection. Your location is masked from outside observers and your connection to the net is encrypted. So long as you connect to a website with an address that begins with “HTTPS,” your connection and the data stream between you and that connection remains private.

Why use a VPN?

Even if you never get within a “seleska milya” (country mile) of Bulgaria, there are advantages of routing your internet connection to a VPN server outside the country. Those advantages are all about privacy and security, as well as bypassing geo-blocking.

10 principal advantages of using a VPN

1. Your connection is encrypted.

A VPN provides a “tunneled” connection between your provider and the VPN server. What VPN does best is making long-distance and secure connections between networks. Premium VPNs like Surfshark provide 256-bit encryption and the fastest connections.

2. Your web browsing becomes more secure.

The encryption shores up vulnerabilities in your browser. It secures your browser history from your nosy ISP. Internet service providers try to capitalize on tracking user data and sell it to marketers. When you see a barrage of ads on your browser for a product you recently bought, it is because your activity was detected and monitored.

3. You can use public wifi and escape MITM attacks.

A man in the middle (MITM) attack occurs when someone uses an unsecured public wifi service. The hacker gains access to the information you are passing and receiving to/from a third party and uses the strolen data for fraudulent purposes. The attacks can be live, or the hacker can leave malware that can awaken later.

Hijackers employ clever strategies to carry out their attacks. For example:

• They use a “web pineapple” device to detect and access unsecured networks.

• They spoof a Domain Name Server (DNS) to send the user to fake websites.

• They steal session cookies--unencrypted login information.

• They employ software to detect online activity and intercept data going to and from the user.

• They use a spoofed web application to lure the victim into disclosing login credentials.

Us a VPN whenever logging into a public website.

4. Your web location and activity are hidden and masked.

The main purpose of a VPN is to mask the user’s online activity. It does that through deception and, as previously mentioned, encryption. Your location is hidden, because your ISP address is transferred to another server—in Bulgaria, for example. Your activity is masked because of the below described no-logs policy.

5. With a no-logs policy, you can further hide your activity.

In addition to location masking, a premium VPN like Surfshark has a “no-logs” policy. That means that the VPN server will not collect any records of the user’s web activity. ISPs could not, even under subpoena, produce any record of the user’s online activities. Those records do not exist.

6. You can by-pass geo-blocking and censorship.

Geo-blocking detects a user’s geographical area based on the ISP address. The user is then denied access to content available only to local users. Likewise, there are some authoritarian governments that block their citizens from accessing foreign websites considered subversive or controversial.

7. You can be a better shopper.

Some vendors have different price structures for more affluent geographical areas and choose to geo-block users seeking lower prices elsewhere. With a VPN like Surfshark, you can defeat geo-blocking by logging into a local server.

Hotels, airlines, ticketing agencies and car rental services also use differential pricing practices. For example, when shopping from certain IP locations, the customer could see a variety of ticket prices for the same trip. Smart shoppers can log into a VPN server at the travel destination and do some wise comparison shopping.

8. You can access unlimited entertainment.

Premium VPNs like Surfshark can successfully bypass local area restrictions to streaming services like Netflix. Because of copyright restrictions, for example, a certain popular movie or television program might not be available outside a certain area.

So, geo-blocking consists of local web restrictions. For example, Netflix programming often varies from region to region. Those programming differences are because of local licensing. So, what may be available in the U.S. is not always available for U.K. viewers, and vice versa.

Sports fans can likewise be denied access to their favorite local teams on the internet. Leagues and teams frequently blackout local games for a variety of commercial and licensing reasons. VPNs can bypass those blackouts.

9. You can have extra security in handling Bitcoin.

Bitcoin miners/investors access an encrypted blockchain network, but are still vulnerable to bots and malware that can steal encryption keys from their computers through so-called crypto jacking malware. VPN adds an additional layer of anonymity and deception by masking the user’s connection.

10 With a premium VPN like Surfshark, you can access some very nice extras.

Surfshark’s premium VPN service includes a web security feature called CleanWeb™ . This feature blocks intrusive ads, web trackers, phishing attempts, and malware.

What About Free VPNs?

There are a number of free VPN services available. They do not charge a subscription fee, but they exploit their users to make money in the following ways:

1. Free VPNs log and track your web business. This defeats the purpose of a VPN, which is to keep user data private. Free VPNs frequently load third-party trackers into the user’s browsers. Those trackers gather data and sell it to marketers.

2. Free VPNs can drag down the speed of the user’s internet connection. That slowdown can be caused by intrusive popup ads slowing browser performance or the user taking a backseat to the VPN’s paying customers.

3. Free VPNs can be a vector for hackers’ secondary attacks. Free VPNs are more likely to contain malware. Most of that malware has been detected as being embedded in advertising they push to clients.

Essentially, free VPNs are stripped down versions of premium and full-featured VPN services. Those free products should be used with caution and with the knowledge that the service provider may be monitoring the user’s data.

Premium VPNs Are Your Best Bet

A premium VPN like Surfshark:

• can guarantee a “no-logs” policy where the user is never tracked, nor are any records kept of the user’s activity—This is the guarantee that the user’s activity cannot be easily traced.

• provides the best state-of-the-art connection and high-quality, top-grade 256-bit encryption

• prevents data leakage—Surfshark, for example, features a “kill switch” to close the user’s connection if the VPN server gets disconnected

• is most effective in bypassing geo-blocking—When a streaming service detects a server as a VPN connection, Surfshark will move to another not detected by the service.

A Word of Caution

VPNs are neither malware- nor virus-hunters. Premium VPN services like Surfshark have encryption protocols with built-in security features. They do not provide full protection against virus injection through phishing or clicking on links in unsecured web sites. You should always rely on regularly updated anti-virus programs, along with web malware detectors and blocks like Surfshark’s CleanWeb™.

When comparing free VPNs to premium services, be aware that VPNs do not offer absolute protection against cyber-attacks. Again, a VPN cannot prevent a user from downloading a cleverly concealed piece of malware from an insecure website or compromising a password as a result of a phishing attack.

Think of a VPN as an invisible mobile shield. It hides the user’s IP address and spoofs the user’s location. A VPN is another bit of insurance, and the user should rely on anti-malware protection, a good password strategy, along with file encryption as commonsense security practices. Those practices should include using only secure websites. Also, remember that hackers rely on user trust, curiosity, carelessness, and gullibility.

Summary

Essentially, here’s what a premium VPN in Bulgaria can do:

• bypass content locked out from a local access point—Some in-country content overseas is not available to U.S. IP address users.

• encrypt all your connection and the data you transmit—Total privacy is guaranteed by encryption. Without the encryption key, an intruder sees only garbled gibberish.

• hide the user’s browser history from prying ISPs, who frequently sell user data to marketers, who tailor usage data to call up annoying popup ads.

• allow file sharing to be completely private and anonymous—Sensitive files and documents travel securely through a VPN “tunnel.”

• add another layer of protection against cybersecurity attacks—Hackers and snoopers have to locate and detect before they can hack.

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