Setting up a personal VPN server?

[talos]

Has anyone here created their own VPN server?

I've been looking into seeing if it's possible to be able to set up my own VPN server at home to hide my ip address. I'm still at a point to try and understand if purchasing a flash router will help hide my public ip address and not just give me access to my LAN at home with access to just private ips. Clearly we need ebay to see our public ip and not our LAN.

Has anyone tried this themselves? Is it possible?

Here is what I've been looking at: How to Set Up Your Own Home VPN Server

[empirestate]

I have a linux server running my dedicated VPN 24hrs 7 days of the week. I pay only $5.

[IGNAS]

Wouldn't it be easier to purchase a reliable VPN or VPS instead?
Maybe even a dongle for dynamic IPs? : )

[empirestate]

well easier for noobish people but for IT professional like me, takes like less than 5min.

[talos]

Originally Posted by empirestate

well easier for noobish people but for IT professional like me, takes like less than 5min.

You created your own IP address to connect to in your own home? I'm not understanding what exactly costs $5 for you because I'm looking to not pay any service. I figured to just get a piece of hardware, like a flash router for example, and set up a VPN server on it to connect to. Would you elaborate?

[phaz0rz]

I read the article you referenced, and I don't think this is going to accomplish what you're trying to do. The article describes how to create a VPN tunnel to your home network so you can access your home network from anywhere. Meaning you can create a VPN this way but when you connect, you're going to have the same public IP as if you're on your home computer.

Private IP's are never seen by anyone on the internet. They are used only to identify you on your local network. When you are on the internet using your home network, your router serves as a local NAT device. The router/NAT encapsulates all packets with the public IP and discards the private IP if the packet is internet-bound. Therefore all traffic coming from the local intranet leaves the network with your public IP. The private IP is irrelevant.

I asked 24vc a while back how they get "Fresh IP's" when there are no new IPv4 addresses (the IPv4 pool was depleted a few years ago, when I was still in college). They told me they buy their IP's directly from RIPE, which I'm assuming is some kind of IP authority. Then they assign IP's to servers and set up VPN's to sell. So for you to create a VPN with a Fresh IP you would have to get another IP somehow. You could maybe set up a connection with another service provider in your area and get a new IP to set up a VPN with. But it's just not worth the trouble or expense. You would end up paying less by just using a VPN provider.

[talos]

Originally Posted by phaz0rz

I read the article you referenced, and I don't think this is going to accomplish what you're trying to do. The article describes how to create a VPN tunnel to your home network so you can access your home network from anywhere. Meaning you can create a VPN this way but when you connect, you're going to have the same public IP as if you're on your home computer.

Private IP's are never seen by anyone on the internet. They are used only to identify you on your local network. When you are on the internet using your home network, your router serves as a local NAT device. The router/NAT encapsulates all packets with the public IP and discards the private IP if the packet is internet-bound. Therefore all traffic coming from the local intranet leaves the network with your public IP. The private IP is irrelevant.

I asked 24vc a while back how they get "Fresh IP's" when there are no new IPv4 addresses (the IPv4 pool was depleted a few years ago, when I was still in college). They told me they buy their IP's directly from RIPE, which I'm assuming is some kind of IP authority. Then they assign IP's to servers and set up VPN's to sell. So for you to create a VPN with a Fresh IP you would have to get another IP somehow. You could maybe set up a connection with another service provider in your area and get a new IP to set up a VPN with. But it's just not worth the trouble or expense. You would end up paying less by just using a VPN provider.

This is exactly what I was thinking. I watched a few videos and understood that pretty much whatever my ISP is providing me, will be what all of the internet sees.

It is interesting exactly how these services manage to get ip's and lease them for such a cheap price. For instance, my connection to my ISP is like...what? $60. And then you have these VPN services that can just provide you with whatever amount of IP's you need so you can connect to these servers and they are in the average of $10 an IP. I guess the difference being is that the ISP provides access to the internet, and a VPN is just a bridge to someone else's...LAN?

[phaz0rz]

Originally Posted by talos

This is exactly what I was thinking. I watched a few videos and understood that pretty much whatever my ISP is providing me, will be what all of the internet sees.

It is interesting exactly how these services manage to get ip's and lease them for such a cheap price. For instance, my connection to my ISP is like...what? $60. And then you have these VPN services that can just provide you with whatever amount of IP's you need so you can connect to these servers and they are in the average of $10 an IP. I guess the difference being is that the ISP provides access to the internet, and a VPN is just a bridge to someone else's...LAN?

Yes, exactly. All a VPN service provider does is give you paid access to their virtual network so you can have a different IP. They get IP's directly from this place called RIPE in bulk. From what I understand from checking out RIPE, it is free to request IPv4 addresses if you meet certain requirements. VPN providers have to charge a fee to maintain their many servers, pay support staff, and keep the power on.

You still have to have an internet connection to access a VPN.

In reality internet providers could give much cheaper prices for internet access. But internet service is fairly monopolized by region so providers charge whatever they want. Naturally the VPN market has to be more competitive since users have their choice of hundreds of VPN providers, while we are lucky if we have 2 ISP's to choose from.

Source: https://www.ripe.net/manage-ips-and-asns/ipv4