VPNs Secure Online Gamers from DDoS Attacks

VPNs were traditionally avoided by online professional gamers because they could not provide ideal speeds of data transmission as the data was routed to a secure server before reaching the destination. However, over the years massive improvements have taken place in the sphere of VPNs and gaming VPNs are today a must for gamers.

How can DDoS affect gamers?

Gaming VPNs are today not only used to bypass geo-restrictions or get access to games which have been launched in particular countries by getting a fake IP address from a server located in that country but it is used to prevent and restrict deadly DDoS (distributed denial-of-service attack) hacking attempts. As professional gaming tournaments become more serious, the urge of players to win prestigious tournaments also increases concomitantly.

Hence, some players also resort to unfair means to decimate their opponents. They flood the server of an opponent with numerous queries so as to overload the system and making it crash. That means legitimate requests from you get obstructed and the system becomes so slow that in a multiplayer game, you can suddenly become a sitting duck and get eliminated.

Unlike DoS where usually a single machine is used, DDoS attackers use zombie computers or bots and launch attacks from often thousands of unique IP addresses and the traffic is so gigantic that if allowed unchecked, most servers in the world would crash. While a gaming VPN may not be able to prevent a DDoS attack on a gaming server, it can protect individual machines effectively and can also improve their speed.

DDoS attackers often scan the internet looking for unprotected IP addresses and once that is available, deluging the host with mindless requests is easy. Sometimes, it is done to glean personal information but DDoS is mainly launched to temporarily paralyze a system so that a gamer can get both fame and fortune (both of which are available at gaming circuits).

How can VPNs help?

A Virtual Private Network (VPN) can create thousands of unique IP addresses for a user and mask his actual IP address. Also, the data is transmitted through secure tunnels which are impregnable due to heavy encryption.

Nowadays, VPNs instead of increasing your latency can reduce it, reduce lag and disconnections which can wreak havoc for a professional gamer and also reduce throttle. Many internet service providers (ISPs) reroute your traffic of requests through unoptimized or poorly optimized routes out of cost considerations. Consequently, lag increases and it also makes you more susceptible to DDoS attacks. A VPN will provide you a secured passage. Also, good VPN services provide you with 100% killswitches which keep your IP address hidden even if you are not connected to your VPN server.

Conclusion

A gaming VPN is very important for online gamers to protect themselves from DDoS attacks and to get entry into restricted zones. It also keeps their IP address hidden and protected even if they have to click on unknown links. But, you will have to be careful about the links you click and not compromise your security because the path between exit server and end destination is not encrypted.