Secure wifi hotspot browsing with VPN
August 3, 2011 11:21 AM Subscribe
I want to set up my iPad to connect to my home router from whatever wifi I happen to be on. I want a tunnel, I want all traffic going through the tunnel. All I want the wifi to see is that there is an iPad and it is connected to one place and there is data going back and forth.
I thought this would be VPN. I set up OpenVPN on my WRT54GL running TomatoUSB w VPN following the instructions here. I have DynDNS set up. I'm jailbroken on the iPad and have installed GuizmoVPN. The VPN seems to work. The VPN client appears to connect fine without errors.
However, when using the iPad on my employer's network, it doesn't appear that the traffic for Safari at least is going through the tunnel as I am still hitting the filters on the network. Bypassing the filters is a nice way to check, but it is a side benefit. The aim here is secure browsing on all wifi and hotspots for banking, email, etc.
How can I test the VPN is working properly? IE that I can access the remote network's resources. I have a NAS and a wireless printer I can test with.
What am I missing?
Is VPN the way to go? Should I do something else along the lines of SSH or remote desktop?
If I were to use a VPN provider like StrongVPN or HideMyAss, would I have the same issues?
To use OpenVPN, I have to use GuizmoVPN because the built in iOS VPN client only supports L2TP and PPTP. Could OpenVPN be the issue?
Would running the VPN server on a desktop/laptop make any difference vs running it on the router?
Thanks for your help!
I thought this would be VPN. I set up OpenVPN on my WRT54GL running TomatoUSB w VPN following the instructions here. I have DynDNS set up. I'm jailbroken on the iPad and have installed GuizmoVPN. The VPN seems to work. The VPN client appears to connect fine without errors.
However, when using the iPad on my employer's network, it doesn't appear that the traffic for Safari at least is going through the tunnel as I am still hitting the filters on the network. Bypassing the filters is a nice way to check, but it is a side benefit. The aim here is secure browsing on all wifi and hotspots for banking, email, etc.
How can I test the VPN is working properly? IE that I can access the remote network's resources. I have a NAS and a wireless printer I can test with.
What am I missing?
Is VPN the way to go? Should I do something else along the lines of SSH or remote desktop?
If I were to use a VPN provider like StrongVPN or HideMyAss, would I have the same issues?
To use OpenVPN, I have to use GuizmoVPN because the built in iOS VPN client only supports L2TP and PPTP. Could OpenVPN be the issue?
Would running the VPN server on a desktop/laptop make any difference vs running it on the router?
Thanks for your help!
Response by poster: I will check that out, thanks.
I'd like to stick with OpenVPN if possible, it's a bit more secure.
posted by phritosan at 11:37 AM on August 3, 2011
I'd like to stick with OpenVPN if possible, it's a bit more secure.
posted by phritosan at 11:37 AM on August 3, 2011
there is an open-source L2TP server here. no idea if it's something you can do just on your router easily - they don't have a lot of space or compute power - but you could set up a physical machine behind your router and set your router up accordingly to pass L2TP VPN traffic to it. you could also replace your router with a bigger sort of small office-style or small enterprise-style router that comes with L2TP or IPSec; that'd probably cost you a good bit more, though.
if you used a VPN provider, you would be able to use the built-in VPN client as long as it supported L2TP, PPTP or IPSec. the only other real option is doing an HTTP Proxy, which you can set up in the individual settings for the wireless network; I'm not real sure how this works or if it'll only proxy HTTP, though. could be worth looking into. the only other issue I can see with using a VPN provider is that now you have to trust their network. that said, at some point your data's on the general Internet anyway, so it's just a question of how much security are you looking for.
posted by mrg at 4:16 PM on August 3, 2011
if you used a VPN provider, you would be able to use the built-in VPN client as long as it supported L2TP, PPTP or IPSec. the only other real option is doing an HTTP Proxy, which you can set up in the individual settings for the wireless network; I'm not real sure how this works or if it'll only proxy HTTP, though. could be worth looking into. the only other issue I can see with using a VPN provider is that now you have to trust their network. that said, at some point your data's on the general Internet anyway, so it's just a question of how much security are you looking for.
posted by mrg at 4:16 PM on August 3, 2011
Response by poster: Follow up
I'm using HideMyAss PPTP VPN
I still want to be able to browse the net from my home router, but the VPN and FTP server on my network are a decent second.
posted by phritosan at 10:01 AM on September 8, 2011
I'm using HideMyAss PPTP VPN
I still want to be able to browse the net from my home router, but the VPN and FTP server on my network are a decent second.
posted by phritosan at 10:01 AM on September 8, 2011
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by wo is me at 11:35 AM on August 3, 2011