Being able to access Facebook in China is getting to be a bit of an issue these days. Sure there are lots of solutions available on the various blogs and advertising sites, but it's hard to find out what really works. One thing you have to deal with is sifting through the outdated stuff. Posts just seem to lie around for years, and somehow turn on Google page one despite being outdated and useless. Another thing you have to watch out for is advertisements. Many blog owners and site advertisers make money off these sales, and making everything sound great will get you to buy, but what you buy might not work well.

One of those old ways to access Facebook in Vietnam was known on a lot of blogs as the DNS trick. This involved accessing an https version of Google from which you could search for and access Facebook from. Still now, some of the blocked sites in Vietnam are accessible this way. This is because the https as opposed to http is a secure server - you'll see it used when you pay for stuff online. This is harder for the censorship authorities to block because of the security features it has.

Another thing that is frequently posted on technology blogs is something I won't even pretend to understand. There are some of these tech "gurus" that have loop holes mapped out of how users can change settings and modify their Internet connection to access Facebook in Vietnam. I take one look at these and get dizzy. Lines of code and words I've never heard of just make my head hurt. Never mind. Give me another solution.

So I use a virtual private network to access Facebook in Vietnam. It's not the only way, but it is the best one I've tried. There are two similar solutions, called proxies and web based services that also work well, but here's why I choose to use a VPN.

If VPN's have the highest security of all three solutions. I don't fully understand to be honest, but many review sites talk about "encryption" and "tunneling", which proxies and web based services don't offer. Ok, so if I don't understand what it is, why do I want it? Well, paid proxies and web based services are going to cost you the same amount anyway, so why not pay the same price for something better?

Any VPN service is going to cost you about 80 to 120 dollars a year, or 5 to 10 dollars a month. There's not much of a price difference if you decide to go with web based or proxies. What I do know is that VPNs provide much higher levels of security for the same price. This is why I use a VPN to access Facebook in Vietnam

There are free services out there, but many times you have to deal with pop-up advertisements, and they're not fast enough to stream video because their servers are backlogged with other people seeking freebies. Another thing they do is limit your bandwidth which means you can only use it sometimes, or on certain devices or operating systems. Saving a few bucks a month isn't worth it for me, and I'd rather pay a bit extra for smooth sailing and unrestricted Internet.