When looking for a VPN, most Chinese citizens are trying to circumvent the Great Firewall and gain access to the world’s most popular search engine
August 18, 2020. China has a long history of internet censorship. The country has its own tools to replace global services like Google and Facebook. Moreover, the Chinese government has shielded its citizens from the external world with the Great Firewall, which helps the government to control what citizens can get access to. VPN services are some of the most popular tools to circumvent it.
New research by NordVPN reveals that when looking for VPN services on Baidu, the local equivalent of Google, the Chinese are trying to get access to Google the most. 40.35% of all VPN service-related searches have to do with Google.
YouTube comes second on the list, accounting for 31.58% of all searches. Interestingly, another research by NordVPN has shown that YouTube holds the most desired restricted content, with 82.7% of internet users worldwide searching for how to unblock this video sharing platform.
Most popular social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram share the rest of the interest of Chinese citizens and made it to the TOP-5 list of sought-after online platforms. Each site accounts for roughly 8% of search queries.
VPN is widely used in the country. This is mainly for two reasons: to access restricted online services and to enhance their online security. China is the leading country by the number of exposed user credentials. NordPass researchers found that 2,6 billion Chinese user entries, including email addresses and passwords, are up for grabs on the dark web. This makes privacy tools more of a necessity in the country.
“When choosing a VPN provider, users must look beyond marketing promises and check if the provider keeps no logs as promised,” says Daniel Markusson digital privacy expert at NordVPN.
Methodology: NordVPN researchers estimated search volumes using multiple sources of information, including Google, Ahrefs, and DragonMetrics. The analyzed search queries included the keyword “VPN”. The analysis was based on search volumes over a period of 30 days.
Time frame: 15 June-15 July, 2020
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NordVPN is the world’s most advanced VPN service provider that is more security-oriented than most VPN services. It offers double VPN encryption, malware blocking, and Onion Over VPN. The product is very user-friendly, offers one of the best prices on the market, has over 5,000 servers worldwide, and is P2P-friendly. One of the key features of NordVPN is the zero-log policy. For more information: nordvpn.com.
