Opera VPN is a built-in feature in the Opera browser. It is supposed to secure and anonymize your online activities but what else can it do? Can you use it for P2P file-sharing or is it better to look for better options? In this post, we are answering the question ‘Is Opera VPN good for torrenting?’ Read on to find out whether or not it can protect your P2P activities.
Table of Contents
Can You Torrent with Opera VPN?
Let’s first figure out what Opera VPN is. Unlike other VPNs, Opera VPN is only a browser extension. It supplies no clients for your computer or mobile device. Opera VPN affects only traffic that goes through your Opera browser, that’s it.
When you open a torrent website, Opera VPN can hide your identity for a while. But once you click a download button, the download process will start through uTorrent, BitTorrent, Vuze, or another torrent client installed on your device. The traffic will split, and the part that falls on the torrent app will remain unprotected. If you don’t cancel downloading, your true identity will be seen to your ISP, the torrent website, seeds & peers, and, eventually, copyright holders. Summing up, Opera VPN is useless for torrenting and P2P file sharing.
Can I Still Use Opera VPN for Other Tasks?
Did you ever hear that free cheese is only in a mousetrap? When it comes to Opera VPN, this saying couldn’t be more accurate. You get some degree of anonymity with it and it is probably better than unsecured browsing. Yet, it falls flat on its face when it comes to ultimate protection and ease of use.
Opera VPN isn’t a secure solution. It delivers 256-Bit AES encryption but it doesn’t reveal the connection protocols. This fact suggests that they are not so good. Besides, Opera VPN tends to leak your original IP address.
Opera VPN isn’t fast either. You need a good connection speed for any Internet activity. When there are only 10 servers serving millions of clients, you cannot hope for a decent connection.
Opera VPN logs your activities. In its privacy policy, Opera says that it ‘doesn’t log any information about your browsing activity and originating network address’. Along with that, it monitors ‘device ID and hardware specification, operating system and environment configuration, and feature usage data’. The latter means that logging is in place. Considering that this information is stored for three years, using Opera VPN can be harmful to your privacy.
Opera VPN has unclear jurisdiction. The Opera brand is registered in Norway, which is a good country from a security perspective. The problem is that its VPN network is managed by the former SurfEasy company, which is headquartered in Canada, the Five Eyes country. It is still not clear whether Opera VPN has a privacy-friendly Norwegian jurisdiction or privacy-hostile Canadian jurisdiction.
Opera VPN Alternatives to Torrent Safely
Opera VPN doesn’t cater to torrent users at all. Instead, you can pick from plenty of real VPNs that have all the necessary security and torrent-enhancing features in place. The three VPNs for torrenting we recommend below deliver military-grade encryption, ultra-fast speeds, convenient desktop apps for every possible device, transparent zero-logging policies, and many other features to streamline your activities.
- Provider
- User Rating
- Our Review
- Price
PureVPN- 4807 Votes
- $3.24 / month
ExpressVPN- 3795 Votes
- $6.67 / month
Conclusion
Opera VPN is not good for torrenting and P2P. It can’t protect all the Internet traffic passing through your device. It leaves torrent clients unprotected. Check out the list of VPNs we recommend in this article if you want to fully enjoy your torrenting experience.