Everything you need to know about encryption on Zoog's free VPN

What is Zoog and how is its free plan?

Zoog was founded in 2013 by a group of tech enthusiasts and is based in Greece. The service offers premium and paid plans to users, where the premium plan has more features and server access. But today, we will focus on the free version of Zoog.

 

Zoog is a no-logs VPN service, meaning it doesn't log or share the data the service encrypts for you. This is a big plus in terms of security and privacy.

The free Zoog plan gives you 6 different server locations (the other 63 available servers are for premium members only). For a basic, free VPN, 6 options is not too bad a number. You can connect to servers in Germany, the Netherlands, Singapore (2 servers), London and Washington.

The Zoog app is easy to use and doesn't take much getting used to.

The interface itself is pretty basic, with a simple home screen that lets you activate or deactivate your VPN, as well as see how much of your monthly data limit you've used. The free Zoog plan gives users 10GB of data monthly. This level is not too much, but enough for browsing and watching videos.

You can also toggle VPN protocols in Zoog's app settings and enable auto-reconnect, connect-on-start, and VPN shadowing (allowing you to bypass censored firewalls).

But when it comes to VPNs, security matters above all else. So what kind of encryption does Zoog offer its customers to keep Internet traffic secure?

Zoog's encryption standard

Many popular VPN providers today use AES-256 encryption to secure user data. This is a symmetric key cipher that uses a 256-bit key to encrypt data. AES stands for Advanced Encryption Standard (or Rijndael) and is used by many governments, security agencies, and VPN providers around the world to keep data from being accessed by unauthorized parties.

 

ExpressVPN, SurfShark, NordVPN, Windscribe, ProtonVPN, and Zoog's premium plan all use AES-256. However, Zoog does not use AES-256 encryption on the free version. Instead, it uses AES-128 encryption. As you might have guessed, the difference between these two encryption ciphers is the number of bits used in the key. AES-256 uses 256 bits, and AES-128 uses 128.

But this doesn't mean Zoog isn't safe. AES-128 encryption is still very hard to beat. In fact, AES encryption has never been cracked, either 128-bit or 256-bit ciphers. There is also a 192-bit AES cipher, which has also never been cracked. Overall, this coding standard works very well.

As it says on the Zoog website, "Even if the most powerful computer on Earth were trying to crack a 128-bit key, it would still take about 139 trillion years." So you can have complete peace of mind.

In fact, AES-128 encryption can outperform AES-256 in a number of ways. First, AES-128 is faster and more efficient.

If you want to use Zoog and enjoy the benefits of AES-256, you need to upgrade to the premium plan. You can pay monthly or bulk purchase a 1-year or 2-year membership. Prices are as follows:

1. $9.99/month (no contract).
2. $44.88 for two years (equivalent to $1.87/month).
3. $35.88 for one year (equivalent to $2.99/month).

Is Zoog's free VPN safe to use?

Although Zoog uses two different encryption ciphers on the free and premium plans, both are highly secure, meaning Zoog is safe to use in any way.

But if AES-128 encryption isn't for you, don't worry. There are plenty of free VPN services that use 256-bit encryption (including TunnelBear and PrivadoVPN), you should have no trouble finding one with more secure encryption.

While Zoog's free and premium plans use two different AES encryption ciphers, both are highly secure, meaning your data will be fully encrypted on both versions. So, if you're looking to save money and don't mind missing out on certain features, Zoog's free VPN service might be right for you.