How to Stay Secure While in Starbucks - Using Free Wi-Fi

Starbucks. Pretty good coffee. But it’s not about the coffee. It’s about the place. People go there to work. People go there on dates. People go there to meet up with people. Nice atmosphere, well when it’s not overpacked of course.

And it is a great place to work in. There’s plenty of sockets. There’s Wi-Fi. There are tables. It’s great in terms of that. But staying secure while in Starbucks is not a thing because the free Wi-Fi is an open network.

And open networks and work don’t get along.

Here’s why.

You turn on your laptop. You go to your social media pages. Boom. With simple software, somebody in Starbucks can see your details. In terms of work, somebody might see confidential details when it comes to your projects.

Let’s give another example.

You go to a certain website. Somebody will be able to see that you went into it.

Let’s give a final example.

You pay for something on the internet. Somebody gets your payment information.

Open networks are not great. You are not encrypted. People can see what you are up to. They can steal your information.

You get internet for free in Starbucks, but what cost?

Now, to be fair, it’s not just Starbucks that has open networks. It’s pretty much every place with free Wi-Fi that you go to. That’s the cost of allowing everybody to use it.

But is it possible to stay secure while in Starbucks? Of course.

Encrypt Your Content

How do you do that? Simple. Use a VPN. A VPN is a virtual private network. It allows you to be anywhere in the world that you desire in terms of location. It’s perfect ffor unlocking apps like Netflix and Amazon Prime. But, its main benefit is the fact that it Encrypts what you do. Everything you access is private.

Encryption converts electronic data into ciphertext, which is unreadable without the correct key to transform it back into plain text. What does that mean? It means that an average Joe won’t be able to see what you are up to on your devices in Starbucks.

So How Do You Install PrivateVPN to Stay Secure While in Starbucks

• The first step is to go into PrivateVPN.com. Press the Buy button.
• You will be taken to a section where you have to provide your preferred plan, a method of payment, email, and password. And yes, you have 30 days to ask for a full refund if you don’t like the website.
• You then need to search for PrivateVPN in the Play Store or App Store. If you are using Windows or MacOS, then you need to scroll to the bottom of the PrivateVPN website and press Download. There you will find an app for your device. Download it and install it.

After you do that, you need to select the server of your choice. For convenience, you should probably select a server in your country, especially in terms of paying for stuff online. But if you are looking to access content that isn’t available in your country, then the US servers are a great choice.

Conclusion

Open networks are not safe. People can see what you are up to. So if you want to stay secure while in Starbucks, you can.

Written by Michael Smolski.