Automatic Selection
Ease of use is one of our cornerstones. PureVPN apps can automatically choose the VPN protocol best suited for your connection. All you have to do is connect and we take care of the rest for you.
Internet Protocol Security, also commonly known as IPSec, is a framework of open standards developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) to provide cryptographically-based security to network traffic. Besides protecting one or more data flows between IPSec peers, it also enables data origin authentication, confidentiality, integrity and anti-replay.
Offering support for both IPv4 and IPv6, IPSec is widely deployed when it comes to the implementation of Virtual Private Networks (VPN). As such, the terms IPSec VPN or VPN over IPSec refer to the process of establishing VPN connections using IPSec protocol. It is a common method for creating a virtual, encrypted link over the unsecured Internet.
IPSec provides protection against replay attacks by assigning a unique sequence number to each packet. If a packet with a duplicate sequence number is detected, it is considered replayed and dropped.
Hash message authentication code (HMAC) algorithms verify that the packets you receive are unchanged and sent by your peer.
PFS in an IPSec VPN service enhances the security of your VPN connection by ensuring a unique session key is created for each negotiation.
IPSec works below the transport layer, so it is transparent to users and applications. Therefore, you do not need to make any changes to software when implementing it on your router or firewall.
The process of re-keying at set intervals means you can bid farewell to manual reconfiguration of secret keys and stay protected against most interception and impersonation attacks.
Since packets are encrypted by the sender before transmission, rest assured that sensitive data will only reach its intended recipient.
IPSec (IKEv2, L2TP) vs SSL (OpenVPN, SSTP)
The following is an in-depth comparison between SSL and IPSec protocols
OpenVPN | SSTP | IKEv2 | L2TP | PPTP | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Encryption | 256-bit | 256-bit | 256-bit | 256-bit | 128-bit |
Security | OpenVPN can be considered extremely secure when used in conjunction with robust cipher and ephemeral keys | Can be considered as secure as OpenVPN when used in conjunction with robust cipher and ephemeral keys | Latest VPN protocol which implements IPSec and is highly secure | IPSec over L2TP, when properly implemented, has no major known vulnerabilities | PPTP implementation has several known security vulnerabilities |
Stability | Stable Connection | Stable, but more so on Windows | Highly stable and consistent connection once established | Stable Connection | Unstable and may disconnect frequently |
Speed | Great speed across long distances and on connections with high latency | Faster than PPTP and L2TP | Faster than other VPN protocols due to MOBIIKE support, which makes it stable and resilient | L2TL/IPSec is still fast, despite tunneling overhead, due to high encryption/decryption efficiency. | Fastest VPN protocol because of basic encryption |
Supported OS | Windows OS iOS (Manual) Android Mac OS X (Manual) And More... | Windows OS iOS (Not Supported) Android (Not Supported) MAC OS X And More... | Windows OS iOS Android (Manual) Mac OS X (Manual) BlackBerry (Manual) | Windows OS iOS (Manual) Android (Manual) Mac OS X (Manual) And More... | All Platforms (Manual) |
Conclusion | Good speed, strong security, native support for most OS. | Safer and faster than PPTP and L2TP, ideal for Windows OS, can easily bypass firewalls | Fast speed, strong security, the only VPN protocol supported by Blackberry | Easy-to-setup, stable, and secure | Highly recommended for speed, but isn’t the best option for security |
PureVPN offers support for all major VPN protocols and platforms.
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Ease of use is one of our cornerstones. PureVPN apps can automatically choose the VPN protocol best suited for your connection. All you have to do is connect and we take care of the rest for you.
Alternatively, you also have the option of using a different protocol for your VPN connection. We’d advise that you take a look at our VPN comparison chart for a better understanding of what each brings to the table. Still uncertain? It is advised that you try these VPN protocols in the following order: