Your Internet service provider (ISP) can easily learn everything about your online activity if you’re not cautious enough.
In order to remain anonymous while browsing online, you can hide your virtual ID card from your ISP.
In this article, you can read about tools that help to shield your activity.
What Does My ISP Know About Me?
Your Internet Service Provider knows everything that you do online.
Not only that, they record all of this data as well. This data includes everything from the sites you've visited, the data transferred, if you're torrenting, and probably anything else you can think of.
In some countries, your ISP won't do anything with this data - but this is very rare!
For most cases they will use it to analyze their users and sell their data, and in worse case scenarios, they can sell you out to the government (or be ordered to release the data).
How to Hide Your Internet Activities From Your ISP
So now you know what your ISP knows about you - literally everything you do online.
It's time to learn how to hide your internet activities from your ISP.
Use a VPN
A VPN (Virtual Private Network) provides an encrypted network connection through the public network, therefore shielding your IP address from prying eyes.
It is possibly the safest way to keep your privacy, and browse online without your ISP tracking and logging your online activity.
There are free VPN services out there, but please, note that they may not worth taking the risk, as their revenue doesn’t depend on keeping you anonymous and safe on the internet.
However, VPN services that require payment are definitely going to keep you safe and private, as a contract binds them to do that.
Here you can see a list of the best vpn services that we picked out of a broad selection to offer you truly the best of them all.
Use a Proxy
A proxy is similar to a VPN, but it will only protect your internet browser traffic.
However, proxies are often not a hundred percent safe to use. The host of the proxy server can see your IP address and the traffic that goes through the proxy.
Public proxies, just like free VPNs are not safe at all as anybody can run them, they are slow, and you don’t have any reason to trust the operator that runs the proxy.
Instead of public proxies, it is recommended to use private proxies as they are faster and safer. For a more thorough analysis on proxies, read our Proxy Server Guide and learn more about the differences and similarities between proxies and VPNs.
Browse with Tor
Tor is a different kind of browser. It works by routing your connection through multiple nodes.
This is why it's called Tor - The Onion Router. Your traffic goes through multiple layers like in an onion.
It's completely free, and will keep your internet browsing activities safe and secure. Many people use a VPN and Tor together for improved security and privacy. if you want to do this you will need a Tor VPN as not every service works with Tor.
Unfortunately, unlike a VPN, it will only protect your internet browsing activities. Furthermore, it will severely hinder your internet speeds.
How to Torrent Without Your ISP Knowing
Downloading content from the Internet might seem simple and harmless, but there are safety measures you should consider before downloading anything. Torrenting in itself is not illegal. However, there are copyrighted materials that must not be downloaded without paying for it.
Please note, that ProPrivacy.com does not endorse or encourage illegal torrenting or illegal online activities. We do encourage downloading free legal content instead, and if you’re interested in where to find great stuff for free, this article about free legal torrent sites is a gold mine for you.
How To Hide From Your ISP: Conclusion
Your ISP can take a peek at anything you get up to online – and obviously, that's not ideal. There are things that you might want to hide from your provider, not because they are illegal or because there’s anything particularly wrong with them, but because you simply don’t want the whole world to know about the sites and services you frequent.
That’s when privacy services come in handy. The most secure choice is definitely a commercial VPN service, however, nowadays you can choose from all sorts of different services that help users to remain safe and private on the internet.