Is BitTorrent Safe? Must-Know Facts

Common risks of using BitTorrent  

The short answer to your question: Yes, BitTorrent is not safe to use. It doesn’t necessarily mean it’s impossible to use it without exposing your online security, but there are threats you can’t ignore:  

• Hacker attacks. Your innocent BitTorrent client can become a part of a big cyber crime. The researchers from the University of London, confirmed that several prominent BitTorrent clients like uTorrent, Mainline, and Vuze are vulnerable to distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks as hackers can easily exploit their peer-to-peer (p2p) file sharing protocols. Long story short, your device can get involved in a huge hacker attack without you even realizing it.
• Phishing. Another risk of using BitTorrent is downloading a torrent file from a phishing site that will leak your personal information and your online activity record. As an outcome, your private data, such as geolocation, contact info and other personal information might get into the wrong hands just because you wanted to download a file from a deceptive torrent site. 
• Malware. Since BitTorrent can share files, this means it can distribute malware too. This is how hackers managed to spread a crypto mining malware called Dofoli to infect over 400,000 Windows PCs. The hackers found a loophole in the MediaGet client to spread Dofoli as the client’s update which was coming soon. As a result, thousands of users installed a fake infected update that distributed the malware across the network. 
• Internet Service Provider (ISP) throttling. Some ISPs can slow down your internet connection as using p2p file sharing may be against their terms of service. There’s no threat to your digital security, but keep in mind that your ISP may limit your connection speed for downloading files with a BitTorrent client. 

How to stay safe while using BitTorrent

Since you may face various threats while using BitTorrent, here’s a list of recommendations you need to follow to safeguard yourself:

• Use only reputable websites. Download files only from websites you know well and had a positive experience with. If you are considering downloading content from a site you’ve just heard about, study it carefully. You have to be particularly picky about websites you download your torrents from, since a lot of malware and phishing traps successfully pretend to look like totally secure sites. 
• Ignore pop-up ads and banners. Even when you are confident about the website you want to download torrent from, you should be careful with various banners and ads this site contains. Needless to say, too-good-to-be-true offers is nothing more than a bait into a fraud trap aiming to get your personal information or download malware on your device. 
• Pay attention to the size of files you download. It’s also common that hackers hide malware at popular and relatively secure BitTorrent resources. This means you need to pay special attention to the size of files you download and their type. If you download a an hour-long video presentation, its size can’t be a couple of megabytes and of .exe format (or some other format hardly resembling a video file). When you see that files you download have file size and type not common for a content you download, you’d better stop downloading it.  
• Keep antivirus switched on. Just to be on the safe side, keep your antivirus switched on when you download torrent files. Even though you may overlook some threats, your antivirus software will react on time and notify you about malware leeching off your device. 
• Use a virtual private network (VPN). To shield yourself from malware and risks of leaking your personal information, use a robust VPN as it encrypts all your traffic and hides your real IP address. With a VPN, all the data goes through a separate “tunnel” to a remote server, so that hackers and snoopers won’t be able to read a word of your private information and identify your real location. 

However, a quality BitTorrent VPN service offers much more than just accessing a remote server. Let’s find out what a good VPN product can bring to the table for your torrenting feast.  

Why should you use a VPN with BitTorrent?

Using a reliable VPN for BitTorrent will resolve all security-related issues and beyond. A trailblazing VPN product comes with a lot of useful features you need to secure your torrent downloads. These include: 

• AES 256-bit encryption. It is the best encryption protocol trusted by the U.S. government and relied upon by the National Security Agency to safeguard classified information, a gold standard all credible VPN services use. 
• Hiding IP address. Snoopers and fraudsters aim to exploit not just your online activities or credit card details, but also your physical location for their vice purposes. Using a VPN application enables you to mask your IP address by connecting to a remote server, making hackers believe you are in a different location. 
• Blocking malware and pop-up ads. A reliable VPN service goes beyond merely encrypting your data and connecting to a remote server. It can also detect malware concealed within websites you visit, promptly blocking any potential threats. 
• High connection speed. Despite the common association of VPN connections slowing down the connection speed, top-tier VPN services employ the WireGuard® protocol to enhance data encryption while maintaining a high connection speed.
• Automatic Kill Switch. This feature blocks internet access to your device, in case VPN connection fails all of a sudden, so hackers won’t be able to use this moment to steal your personal information. 
• Servers availability. A comprehensive VPN application should offer a substantial number of servers and diverse locations for your connection. If too many users access the same servers, connection speed can significantly slow down, so a wide range of servers and locations improves the overall performance and reliability of the VPN service.
• No Logs Policy. A trustworthy VPN service strictly adheres to this policy, ensuring that no personal information is collected or sold to third parties.
• Content access. As an extra benefit, a good VPN allows you to access content hassle-free while you’re traveling. Certain countries may impose restrictions on your favorite TV shows, games, series, or sports events, but with a VPN, you can enjoy them as if you are at home.

It’s important to note that free VPN services often fall short of having the above-mentioned features, particularly ones related to connection speed and preserving your information from third parties. For a more credible solution, we recommend considering VeePN, a premium VPN for BitTorrent. This product excels in fulfilling all the mentioned requirements and includes a Double VPN feature that encrypts your data twice. Additionally, VeePN grants access to over 2,500 servers across 89 locations in 60 countries, and it is compatible with all major platforms. Choosing a paid service like VeePN ensures a higher level of performance, security, and features for a safe BitTorrent use.

Get the best torrenting experience with VeePN

BitTorrent is obviously not perfect in terms of security as it’s vulnerable to various threats that will be always present. Being vigilant enough and using a trustworthy VPN is what you need to ensure your BitTorrent experience is the safest possible. 

For vigilance, you have this article, and for a quality VPN service, you need to opt for VeePN — an up-and-coming solution for secure torrenting. VeePN guarantees you not only a safe and fast connection but also additional security tools such as NetGuard, an antimalware app, and antivirus software to protect your device. 

Choose VeePN pricing plan right now to pick the most optimal subscription for you and have a 30-days money-back guarantee!

Written by VeePN Research Lab VeePN Research Lab is dedicated to provide you latest posts about internet security and privacy.

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