In the aftermath of the controversial passing of the UK Online Safety Act, and reports that sales of VPNs have already skyrocketed, sensationalist claims have been going viral on social media that the British government is actively considering making the use of VPNs illegal. Two things needed to be stated clearly here: Firstly, VPNs are completely legal in the UK, and secondly, it is highly unlikely that this is going to change.
Any attempt by the UK government to make the use of VPNs illegal in the UK, or even to simply ban their sale, would be both unworkable and indefensible. Britain would join only a select handful of countries (mostly dictatorships like North Korea) that has banned VPNs. With the government already under fire for restricting people’s freedoms through the Online Safety Act, it is extremely unlikely to implement a ban that had previously only been pursued by totalitarian governments. In the view of most experts, it would also be unworkable too. One expert claimed that” it would be like banning people from smoking in their own homes”. It could also backfire immensely by driving thousands or millions of Brits to use instead TOR and perhaps access the so-called Dark Web.
Meanwhile, British Members of Parliament are not only using VPNs routinely, they are charging the cost of subscriptions to the tax paying public through their expenses claims.
According to Politico website:
It’s not surprising that lawmakers use VPNs given they “handle highly sensitive information daily,” from confidential government documents to private constituent communications, and often connect to unsecured networks when traveling or working remotely, said NordVPN’s Chief Technology Officer Marijus Briedis.
VPNs can “protect this data from potential interception by malicious actors or foreign state-sponsored surveillance” and make it harder for these groups to track officials’ whereabouts, he said.
For the public, too, VPNs “should be seen as a standard online security measure — much like encrypted communications and secure passwords,” said David Peterson, General Manager of Proton VPN.
British Parliamentarians may be using VPNs for other reasons too. It was reported that in the year 2013 alone, over 250,000 visits to porn sites were made from computers at the UK Parliament.
