Are you looking for a simple, easy to use, casual use VPN? Then the Hotspot Shield service could be for you. They remove all the technical details with a straight forward graphical interface. Their service is designed to always be on so it defaults to starting with Windows and requires no further input from the user unless he wants to change the VPN server country. The free service is supported by constantly displaying banner ads in your browser which I found to be annoying. I would rather pay for a VPN service that deal with the distractions that these ads cause.
Pricing and Special Offers
Hotspot Shield is unusual in the VPN space in that they offer a completely free version of their service with unlimited bandwidth. Their free service only allows you to connect to a virtual server with a US location. It limits you to a single connection. Additionally, when you try to change the status of channels in their “selected sites” list, the up-sell to their Elite service will be displayed. Finally, banners for their sponsors will be displayed in the top of your browser as the free service is paid for by third-party ads. Attempting to change the country, add a selected site, or access a selected site will trigger the up-sell ads. This is an always-on plan but you can disabled it if you wish.
Hotspot Shield also offers a paid version of their VPN that they refer to as their Elite service. The Elite service provides access to VPN servers in 18 countries to its members. It displays no banners or ads of any type. You can use five simultaneous connections using the Elite service. Additionally, it provides malware protection while using their service. It is sold in term packages of 6 months, 12 months, and 24 months with larger discounts applied to longer term plans. The six month plan sells for $19.99, the 12 month plan is $29.95, and the 24 month plan is $49.95. The plans are billed as a single payment at the beginning of each term.
Hotpoint Shield supports a few different types of payment options. These include PayPal, major credit cards, and bank transfer. Payment through a PayPal account will let you manage the billing of your VPN subscription through it. They also accept major credit cards like Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover, and JCB. Other payment options include cashU, MOL, Rixty, giropay, necard, bank transfer, paysafecard, and mobile phone depending on your country of choice. Many of these payment options include prepaid cards to protect your anonymity.
Risk Free Trial Period
Hotspot Shield has a free version of their VPN service that will let you see how there service performs. The free VPN service requires no account to use but you will need to download and install the VPN client or app to run it. Although it is subject to the limitations I stated above, this plan has no bandwidth limitations so you should be able to thoroughly evaluate it to see if you want to purchase the Elite service plan. Hotspot Shield also offers a 30-day money back guarantee for those who purchase the Elite version.
Hotspot Shield Network and Server Locations
The Hotspot shield website has very little technical information about their VPN network. I requested some of this information via their support system but did not receive a reply. They have mentioned in the past that they have hundreds of virtual servers worldwide when responding to this question.
Countries
Locations
Servers
Protocols
18
18+
100+
Proprietary VPN based on AES-128
Hotspot Shield paid subscribers have unlimited access to all virtual locations that it currently supports. At the current time, they have 18 such locations. This means that you can use as much data as you want and connect to all server locations. You can also add new locations and URLs to the included list. Additionally, you can connect up to 5 devices through a single account. This is really useful for those who are traveling and want to watch shows back home or in other countries while abroad.
Hotspot Shield has virtual locations in the following countries:
Americas – Canada, United States, Mexico.
Asia Pacific – Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan.
Europe – Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Netherlands, Russian Federation, Sweden, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom.
Privacy and Security
When choosing a VPN service, one concern that many people have is privacy. This includes the privacy of their browsing habits as well as their personal information. This brings a VPN’s logging policy to the forefront. Since Hotpoint Shield’s free VPN is supported by third party advertising, we have some angst about this. They mention that they do not associate your browsing activities with your account information. Also, any information related to your online activities is cleared once your VPN “session” is closed. They say exactly what kind of information they collect, how it is used, and who they share it with. This information is pulled directly from their Privacy Policy page:
User-provided Information. …Your Personal Information is not associated with your online activities when you are using Hotspot Shield and AnchorFree does not require you to provide us with your Personal Information unless you decide to upgrade to Hotspot Shield Elite or to register for an account.
Cookies. When you use our Service, we may send one or more cookies – a small text file containing a string of alphanumeric characters – to your computer. We use both session cookies and persistent cookies. A persistent cookie remains after you close your browser and may be used by your browser on subsequent use of our Service.
“Automatically Collected” Information. When you use our Service, we may automatically record certain information from your web browser by using different types of proprietary technology (such as cookies), which may include your IP address or unique device ID. For example, we may collect your IP address when you commence your use of the Service; we do not, however, store logs associating your IP address with your online activities that take place when you are using of the Service. The automatically-collected information is used by AnchorFree only in the aggregate, in truncated form, or in order to generate a “hashed” or “virtual” IP Address. AnchorFree may use automatically-collected information to identify your general location, improve the Service, or optimize advertisements displayed through the Service.
We may use cookies and automatically-collected information we collect on our Service to: (i) provide customized advertisements, content, and information; (ii) monitor and analyze the effectiveness of Service and third-party marketing activities; and (iii) monitor aggregate site usage metrics such as total number of visitors and pages viewed.
Although they seem to say they do not log individual information just aggregate (group), I believe it would behoove the user to read the Hotspot Shield Privacy Policy in its entirety and make their own decision as to the “true value” of their free service.
Hands-On Testing
Hotspot Shield has custom software for Windows, Mac, iOS (iPhone, iPad), and Android devices. Their Windows and Mac clients install with just a click and have simplified graphical user interfaces. The technical details are automatically handled by their software so no technical expertise is required to use the service. As a result of this, technically inclined users who want more control over their VPN service will probably want to look elsewhere. You can also download the iOS (iPhone, iPad) app from the iTunes Store and Android app from Google Play.
Connecting with the Windows VPN Client
Let’s take a close look at the Hotspot Shield Windows client. When you first run the client, the main connection screen will appear which shows your virtual location, protection level, and current network as shown in the first screenshot in the below illustration. The second screenshot in the illustration shows the virtual location screen which is accessed by selecting the current location (United States). The third screenshot depicts the help screen which you access by clicking the “?” in the upper right corner of the screen. This screen explains how the types of protection are implemented for their service. The rightmost screen in the illustration shows the options menu which is accessed by clicking the blue shield in the upper left part of the main connection screen.
The first thing to notice in the options menu screen is the back arrow which will return you to the main screen. The options themselves are as follows:
Sign Out/In – This selection will either open the screen to sign into the VPN client area or sign you out.
Stop Protection – This selection brings up a screen to temporarily stop the service. It has three options: 15 minutes, 1 hour, or until you press Start to restart it.
Current Network – This selection brings up a screen to let you set the protection type for the current network. It has three settings: Smart, Selected Sites, and Full
Selected Sites – This selection brings up the screen which shows you sites that will be unblocked and protected by default. It also lets paid subscribers add their own sites and URLs.
Setting – This selection brings up the settings menu screen which gives you access to general, selected sites, hotspots and networks, and language. The screen is shown as the first screenshot in the figure below.
Share – This selection opens a browser page to share the service with friends on social media.
Help – This selection opens a browser page to the Hotspot Shield support page on their website.
The settings menu which is shown as the leftmost screenshot in the above figure has four options:
General – This selection lets you control how the VPN behaves. You can have it auto launch as Windows starts and also show as a status icon on the browser page. The second screenshot above shows this screen.
Selected Sites – This selection shows you the unblocked sites and lets you add your own if you are a paid subscriber. The default selected sites include Google, Facebook, Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, ESPN, Disney, HBO, Pandora, and adult sites. These selections change based on country. For example the UK includes iTV and BBC iPlayer. This is illustrated in the third screen in the above figure.
Hotspots and Networks – This selection shows the protection modes for wi-fi hotspots and other networks.
Language – This selection lists the languages supported by the software and lets you choose the one you want
The third option on the setting menu is the Hotspots and Networks option. Selecting it brings up the screen shown leftmost in the below figure. It has four options. Selecting one of these options will allow you to see the current protection type for that network and change it if desired. The second screen in the below figure illustrates this. The last image shown below is the stop protection screen.
They say their service uses proprietary VPN protocols. Its algorithm favors AES-128 more than other standards. The AES-128 standard has been approved by US government agencies to protect classified information up to the “Secret” level. They believe this gives their service more security, better performance, and a larger base of support for common devices and computer platforms. Additionally, all traffic (including DNS requests) are sent through the protected VPN tunnel so users do not need to concern themselves with DNS leaks.
Connect with the Mac VPN Client
In addition to their Windows software, Hotspot Shield also has a functioning Mac client that has all of the same essential features. You can grab the latest version from their website. Like the Windows software, the Mac software uses their proprietary VPN protocol for its encryption.
Connect from iPhone or iPad
Hotspot Shield also offers a free iOS app. You can download it from the Apple iTunes app store. The mobile app requires iOS 7.0 or later. It supports iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. It includes support for the following languages: English, Arabic, French, German, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Turkish. The app is optimized for iPhone 5, iPhone 6, and iPhone 6 Plus.
When you install the Hotspot Shield iOS app on you iPhone or iPad, you will be able to
Turn VPN on/off and change virtual locations right in the app.
Unblock content such as Facebook, YouTube, Netflix, BBC, ITV Player, and Pandora.
Access VoIP and messaging apps including Skype and Viber.
Choose from virtual locations in Australia, Canada, China, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Japan, UK, and US.
Secure online activity with banking-level encryption.
Hide your IP address for maximum privacy & security.
In short the iOS app mimics much of the same functionality of the Windows client.
Connect with the Android App
Hotspot Shield also has an Android app for their VPN service. In addition to the features common to all of their custom software, it has kill switch. This feature will automatically drop your internet connection if the VPN disconnects so that your real IP is not exposed. The figure below shows some partial screens from the app. As you can see, these are similar to those of their Windows client.
The app is very simple to use. You just tap on any virtual location to connect. The fastest server is automatically chosen for you. This app exhibits many of the features of their other custom software applications.
Hotspot Shield Speed Test
I tested the Hotspot Shield service to see how it affected the connection speed. I would expect these results to be typical for their service as I ran several speed tests with similar results.
As you can see there was about a 37% difference in speed between the connection directly to my ISP and the connection to a server in Los Angeles. Encryption adds overhead so you can expect a decrease in connection speed. As always this decrease is a trade off for having a higher level of security. Still, with a speed of nearly 31 Mbps I could easily stream and watch movies from providers like Netflix and Hulu.
Conclusion
Hotspot Shield has a VPN service that will allow you to securely surf the web, stream media from geo-resticted sites, and keep you safe while accessing your personal banking accounts. They have virtual locations in 18 different countries. Their free VPN will let you test out a VPN service if you are a novice user as it makes all the technical decisions for you. Their default is to provide full protection and hide your IP address by tunneling all data to and from your machine through the virtual tunnel created by their service. All you have to do as a paid subscriber is choose full or smart protection and select a virtual location. This makes their service ideal for novice or part time VPN users. However, it may not be robust enough for those that use a VPN all the time and like to have more control when balancing speed and security in their daily use.
What I liked most about the service:
Easy to use Windows and Mac software
Mobile apps for iPhone, iPad and Android
Discounted pricing for term plans
Five simultaneous connections if a paid account
Ideas to improve the service:
Kill switch for custom software other than Android
The option for more protocols with their service
More information about their server network on their website
Consider finding a less intrusive way to offer free VPN
I found their free service to be intrusive and downright annoying at times. Several times it took me off the browser page I was on and opened randomly to the company news page. Luckily I did not lose any of the current content that I was working on. Also after one and a half business days, I still have not received an answer from my support ticket. I recommend evaluating other VPN services rather that opting for their free ad supported VPN.
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