Microsoft to kill off Defender VPN this month

If you were relying on Microsoft's Defender VPN, it's time to find an alternative - Redmond is shutting it down at the end of the month. The heartbreak might be limited: Users had a 50GB data cap per calendar month - after which speeds were throttled to a painful 256 Kbps. On Android and iOS, Microsoft automatically excluded …

[elDog]

Hard to believe that anyone would rely on Microsoft to provide a VPN to improve privacy

Just saying.

Perhaps security at some level, but privacy - hell no.

Obviously they had forged "relations" (means money transfers) with some of the companies (Meta, etc.) that they didn't even bother handling. Of course MS customers aren't the most discerning types.

[Snake]

Re: Hard to believe that anyone would rely on Microsoft to provide a VPN to improve privacy

Post title:

And that's exact why MS is killing it.

Sounds like it won't really be missed.

[captain veg]

If you were relying on Microsoft's Defender VPN

Actually I'd never heard of it before now. Can't imagine what it was supposed to be for.

"speeds were throttled to a painful 256 Kbps"

Ah! Nostalgia.

-A.

[Paul Herber]

Re: If you were relying on Microsoft's Defender VPN

4 ISDN channels!

[David 132]

Re: If you were relying on Microsoft's Defender VPN

If I remember correctly, my first ADSL, circa 1999, was 512Kbit. Which was unbelievably fast - web pages appeared in an instant, a memory that just reinforces my beliefs about the bloat of the Web these days.

It was as fast, in fact, as my first hard drive's 20 megabyte capacity [*unformatted] was capacious.

Now I am lost in nostalgia and have made myself sad.

[ManInThe Bar]

Re: If you were relying on Microsoft's Defender VPN

Mt first HD was a 20Mb Winchester - I was a KING of a vast domain(e).

A ghostly system works to the keying of a ghost

And I look through my tears on the green text of the host

Oh my floppies and my FDisk long ago

[David Hicklin]

Re: If you were relying on Microsoft's Defender VPN

:> my beliefs about the bloat of the Web these days.

Not just the bloat but also those 20+ other URL's that the site scripts shoot off to download all the adverts, images and tracking data

[david 12]

Re: If you were relying on Microsoft's Defender VPN

Can't imagine what it was supposed to be for.

It's not clear to me what exactly has been canceled.

"VPN Defender" is/was Defender for VPN. It integrated MS defender into your MS VPN.

But MS product labeling can be murky at times.

[The Man Who Fell To Earth]

Well there's your problem

I and 99% of Windows users never heard of it.

[Sampler]

Re: Well there's your problem

I like to think of myself as fairly tech savvy - I even did a bit of search recently for a vpn solution for an need I had (went with Tailscale, simple set-up across platforms; linux, android and even, indeed, windows, can't fault it, especially for the price of nothing) and even after reading many articles, forum suggestions and searches, I've never heard of Defender VPN...

[Jurassic.Hermit]

Re: Well there's your problem

It was integrated into the Edge browser, might still be there.

[IGotOut]

Microsoft has a VPN?

Which fools trusted that to keep data safe?

[Paul Crawford]

Re: Microsoft has a VPN?

The same sort of fools running windows 10/11 in the first place, with all that lovely telemetry...

[Martipar]

I had never heard of it

However they state it is exclusive with an Office 365 Subscription, I use LibreOffice and have done for so long that I can't actually recall the last time I had MS Office installed on any computer, it was almost certainly not a legal copy anyway. It was probably Office 2003.

MS Office is fine for work purposes but for casual home use I have no reason to use anything but LibreOffice.

[Tron]

Never heard of it.

And given the restrictions, it hardly counts as a VPN service.

VPNs may be some use as long as they aren't run by the NSA, but there are other options. Widespread deployment of code that allowed users to bounce web data through other sites would allow citizens of oppressive regimes to avoid blocks, whilst creating one or more alt DNS systems would allow data to move across the internet from anywhere to anywhere. This is easier with distributed systems. You can also capture websites and convert them into apps, pipe them as apps across the net or rebuild their functionality on your own system. Websites can even be deployed independent as mobile code.

Data flows like water, we just have to do the plumbing. Development of this was largely frozen by GAFA's dominance, patent abuse and lawyer-led operations, but there is a world of alternate ways to move and process data that we have not yet exploited. A lot of it can operate happily on the current infrastructure, data within data, networks within networks. Plenty to explore.

[Gene Cash]

Re: Never heard of it.

Does the nurse know you have access to the internet?

[Locomotion69]

Dear Microsoft, now the hole is still open...

...could you please shove Recall in it as well ?

[b1k3rdude]

Micro$haft had a VPN product..?

:-D