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This is why you should always use a VPN
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today or it can also look like this.
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Very few VPNs can actually do this and
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those that can't are virtually useless.
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So, what is this? I'll show you not only
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that, but also why VPN are pretty much a
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waste of money, except for the very few
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that can actually do this sort of magic
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that I'm showing here, and I'll tell you
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which ones they are. So, let's begin.
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And no, this video is not sponsored by a
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VPN or anyone for that matter. I've been
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using virtual or private networks ever
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since I started my privacy journey,
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which was when Edward Snowden leaked the
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NSA surveillance files. The reason to
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use a VPN was immediately clear. The
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global network of intelligence agencies
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is spying on all of our phone records
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and internet histories, and they aren't
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doing it by Clintenstein hacking
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operations. They get data directly from
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internet companies who collaborate with
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the surveillance state willingly. It was
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necessary to prevent internet companies
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from having immediate access to all of
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our records. And in a limited sense, VPN
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worked for a while. But from the moment
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I started using VPN, I also realized
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they actually have a major flaw. A flaw
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that makes them not private at all, not
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to mention anonymous. What's that flaw?
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Well, it's not just a flaw. It's an
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outright lie. What the VPN companies are
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selling you in those sponsored YouTube
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segment is a complete fabrication.
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They're making you believe that when you
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use a VPN, you hide your traffic from
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the prying eyes. But you're not hiding
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your traffic from anybody. The VPN
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company sees your full traffic and it's
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impossible for them not to see it. They
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know who you are because they always
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know your true real IP address and they
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know every single website you go to
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because they're routing your traffic for
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you. You're basically trusting them not
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to collect your internet history. They
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may promise not to do it, but you have
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no way of verifying that promise. And
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those prying eyes can easily compromise
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your VPN provider and steal your
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internet records from them instead of
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your ISV. This was always obvious and it
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baffles me that I was the only one
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saying this until I made it a
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monetizable trend on YouTube because it
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was me who first started telling
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everybody that VPNs are a lie. Today you
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see many videos of riding that ad
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revenue train telling you how VPNs are
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bad actually. But it was me who started
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a train. More than 7 years ago I made my
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first video about these VPN lies and
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later on I continued making videos
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bashing the VPN industry. Nobody was
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saying what I was saying at the time
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because VPN providers were running the
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most lucrative advertising business
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available to content creators. Pretty
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much any video talking about VPNs would
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be sponsored by or affiliated with a VPN
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company. Getting sponsored by a VPN
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company to then lie about how much you
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need a VPN for privacy should be a
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career ending conflict of interest in my
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humble opinion. I never took a VPN
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sponsorship deal because I always wanted
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to be free to say anything I felt was
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necessary free from those financial
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constraints. I started the train
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criticizing VPN years before anyone
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else. Not because I was the first to
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figure it out, but because I was the
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first to have integrity and I still have
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that integrity because I will never take
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a sponsorship from a VPN company. Which
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is why I need you to join my Patreon and
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help me continue making my videos. I'm
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not going to shy away from saying this
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anymore. No one who is selling VPN deals
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has integrity to talk about this.
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Despite all of my critiques against VPN,
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I never actually stopped using them. In
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many of my videos, I actually recommend
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VPN for online privacy. That sounds like
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I'm contradicting myself and I'm not
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even paid to do it. What is going on? Am
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I stupid? Well, I might be stupid, but
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I'm also right. And I know how to do
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research and I do it better than anyone
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else on this scene. You will never find
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more deeply researched and better source
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videos on these topics than mine. I
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don't just throw random links. I cross
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reference and annotate everything I talk
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about to triple check that I'm correct.
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So, allow me to explain to you why in
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2025 you actually do need a VPN. And not
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just any VPN, a very small handpicked
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selection of VPNs that actually go
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beyond what anyone else in the industry
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offers. And because this video is not
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sponsored, support my work on Patreon if
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you like what I do. And yes, I did
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undergo a surgery to have a pair of ribs
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removed so that I can perform this self
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brain ding. He's licking his balls. When
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you visit a website, this is what it
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actually looks like behind the scenes.
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Each column represents a packet. A
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packet is just a pile of data traveling
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to and from your device to and from a
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website you are visiting. When you visit
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a website, you're both downloading some
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of this data as well as uploading some
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of your data to the website. These
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packets have different sizes which is
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represented by the length of the column.
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The yellow packets on this graph are
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sent from your device to the website and
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gray packets are sent from the website
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to you. Your data flows through the
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internet at different timestamps which
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means that the space between these
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columns as well as their order also
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matters. It represents different timings
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of each individual packet going back and
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forth. Now, why is all of this
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important? Because every website you go
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to will have its set of packets that
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will form a pattern of different sizes,
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timings, and directions. And every
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website will develop a uniquely
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recognizable pattern, a website
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fingerprint. Now, there are billions of
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websites with billions of fingerprints.
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And knowing every single one of them is
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kind of difficult. But the most popular
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websites, the ones you visit every day,
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their fingerprints are easily
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recognizable. Thus, it is possible to
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discern for an internet company that you
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go to facebook.com even if you use a
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VPN. Even with IP offiscation and all
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the encryption available, spies and
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telekin companies can correlate
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fingerprint patterns of millions of
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websites and see which ones exactly you
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visit and use. This level of attack even
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works in endto-end encrypted messaging
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apps. When you send a text message over
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a signal, its content is encrypted, but
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the pattern of the traffic will be
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observable. If you send an image to your
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signal contacts, there will be a sudden
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spike in the traffic and the adversary
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will be able to detect that you just
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sent an image in your chat. It would
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still be encrypted. They will not be
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able to see what kind of image you send
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obviously. But if you, let's say, just
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downloaded a popular meme or a viral
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image from a current event, the size of
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those packets may be correlated to
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decipher who you are sending your
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naughty memes to. This packet
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correlation can also deidentify
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anonymous users even without
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identifiable information. That's pretty
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crazy. And what makes all of this even
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worse, like way worse, is the
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advancement of deep learning and pattern
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recognition, which is becoming cheaper
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and more powerful every day. AI is being
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deployed by companies and government
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agencies to spy on our traffic and
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decipher what we do, even when our
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connections are encrypted, and it's
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called traffic analysis. The most common
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adversaries deploying traffic analysis
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are ISB companies, government
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authorities, but also third parties like
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data brokers who can purchase your
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internet records and analyze their
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patterns. This means you're always
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exposed to this level of thread no
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matter where you are as long as you're
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connected to the internet. This AI
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enhanced traffic analysis can reveal all
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your browsing habits and behaviors. It
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can tell them where you shop, where you
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get your books and music from, how you
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use social media, who you chat and call
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with, what communities you engage with,
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and everyone's internet records will be
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slightly different. So, traffic analysis
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will always be able to identify you,
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even if you use hidden anonymous
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networks like tour. These AI enhanced
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surveillance techniques are extremely
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powerful. So, the question is, what can
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you do to defend against them? That's
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what the title of this video is about,
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using a VPN that can defend against AI
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enhanced traffic analysis. Thanks to
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some good people around the world,
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various defense methods have already
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been developed and researchers have
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confirmed their ability to reduce the
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accuracy rate of traffic analysis
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attacks. The goal of defense is
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essentially to make these unique data
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fingerprints not unique anymore. So, how
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can it be done? One way to miss these
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unique fingerprints up is by introducing
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dummy packets, but sufficiently advanced
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AI can sometimes discern noise from real
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traffic. So, you might need more than
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one line of defense. Another defense
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technique is imitation, making traffic
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from one website look like traffic from
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another website. There are also these
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alteration defenses that try to
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unpredictably modify the traffic to make
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it harder to trace by an AI. Another
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similar defense is to unpredictably
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split the traffic into multiple paths so
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that AI doesn't know what to do with it.
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There are also more advanced defense
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protocols like maybe not which tries to
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defeat the deep learning traffic
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analysis by lowering its accuracy from
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more than 90% to less than 10%. And one
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of the most ambitious lines of defense
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is so-called mixnet, which is mixing
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traffic from multiple sources together
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to make it an incernible sub of mixed up
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data. So when it comes to picking your
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next VPN, you have to choose one that
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implements a combination of the
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strongest defense tools against AI
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traffic analysis. That's what you are
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here for. So which ones are the best?
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MuladVPN is one of the longest trusted
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VPN providers that just started doing
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that. They have implemented multiple
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defense tools into a new protocol they
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call data. Defense against AIG guided
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traffic analysis. Data is actually doing
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multiple things at once. It is
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introducing random noise into your
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traffic. Basically injecting that fake
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traffic into real traffic. Then data is
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planting dummy packets into the traffic
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itself in both directions between you
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and the server which is to essentially
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modify your real traffic. And the third
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line of defense of data is to create
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constant packet sizes which makes it
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impossible for traffic analysis to find
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fingerprints of the website you go to or
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who you communicate with. There is an
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even more extreme example than this and
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it's from Nimvpn. Nim is actually
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derived from the NIM mixet which is like
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a machine laundering your data and
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offiscating it by rerouting your traffic
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through five noise generating mixnet
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hops. Your data packets are also
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anonymized in a similar way to Mulvad's
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data before reaching their destination.
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NIM's approach is the most comprehensive
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and extreme one that I that I know of.
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Um because it is trying to do this for
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every application to provide the
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broadest network layer privacy. There
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are a few caveats with both Mulad and
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NIM. The traffic analysis defenses are
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not enabled by default. So you have to
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manually choose for them. And the reason
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they are not the default is they're
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another limitation. They are actually
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quite resource intensive. All the
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introduction of dummy packets, fake
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traffic, making all the packets the same
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size, that's going to put a drain on
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your battery as well as your data plan.
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So, I'd recommend that you start with
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this on your PC, see how it works. And
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if you're comfortable with the
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performance, then go ahead and try it on
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your phone. What is going to make things
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better is when more people use these
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defenses, the better tested these tools
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become and the more everyone's traffic
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contributes to the total anonymity of
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everyone's internet usage. These cutting
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edge defense techniques are bound to get
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better and more widely implemented. If I
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had to guess, ProtonVPN and IVPN will be
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the next two providers to adopt a
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variation of them. IVPN recently
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acquired safing which comes with its own
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privacy network that is splitting all of
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their traffic connections into their own
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chains of multiple individual hubs. But
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out of all the names I mentioned here,
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Mulvat in my opinion definitely takes
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the crown. YouTube is doing its job to
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keep me poor. So go and support me on
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Patreon and unlock my podcast. Thank you
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for your time and have a good
