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Type your name into a search engine and you may find a site offering your age, home address, phone number and the names of your relatives. Those sites are called people-search sites, and they are one kind of data broker. Their reports are useful to scammers and stalkers, and they make identity thieves' work easier. This guide explains how these sites work, how to ask them to stop selling your information, what you can realistically expect, and how to do it without handing over more data than necessary. It follows the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) guidance on people-search sites . What Data Brokers and People-Search Sites Do The FTC explains that companies known as data brokers collect information about us and sell or share it with others. People-search sites are a type of data broker. They may buy data from other brokers, collect details from public social media profiles, and compile information from federal, state and local government public records. The FTC lists public rec...

Proton VPN and NordVPN are two of the best-known VPN services, and comparison pages for them are full of superlatives. This article takes a quieter approach. It looks at what each company publicly says about its product, where the two differ in ways that matter, and how to decide whether either one is right for you. A note on sources: everything below comes from the providers' own websites, support pages and blogs, checked in October 2026. Those pages are marketing material as well as information, and features, plans and prices change often, so check the current pages before buying. We do not list prices for that reason, and this article contains no affiliate links. First, What a VPN Does and Does Not Do A VPN encrypts the connection between your device and the VPN provider's server, and shows websites the server's address instead of yours. That can help on untrusted networks such as public Wi-Fi , and it hides your browsing from your internet provider or local network...

Last updated: October 8, 2026 Free Wi-Fi at a cafe, hotel or airport is handy, and it comes with a long list of scary warnings. The truth sits in the middle. Public Wi-Fi is not as dangerous as it was a decade ago, because most websites and apps now encrypt their traffic. It is also not risk-free, and a few specific habits make the difference between a harmless coffee-shop session and a bad day. This guide explains the real risks, what is generally fine to do, what to avoid, and how to set up your phone and laptop for safer connections, using guidance from the FTC, the FCC and CISA. What Are the Real Risks? Eavesdropping on unprotected traffic On an open network without a password, other people connected to the same Wi-Fi may be able to capture your traffic. If a website uses HTTPS, the content of what you send and receive is encrypted, so an eavesdropper sees little beyond which sites you contact. Traffic that does not use HTTPS, or apps with poor encryption, is more exposed. C...

Last updated: October 8, 2026 Advertisements make VPNs sound like a magic shield that makes you anonymous, unhackable and free to watch anything anywhere. The reality is more modest and more useful. A VPN does a few specific things well, and it does nothing at all for many of the threats people worry about. This guide explains what a VPN is, what it protects, what it does not, when it is worth using, what US agencies say about VPN apps, built-in alternatives you may already have, and how to choose one without falling for marketing. What Is a VPN? VPN stands for virtual private network. When you turn on a VPN app, your device creates an encrypted connection to a server run by the VPN provider. Your internet traffic travels through that encrypted tunnel to the server, and then out to the website you asked for. Two things change as a result: The network you are on cannot easily see what you are doing. Your Wi-Fi owner, your internet provider or anyone monitoring the local networ...