Understanding VPN's

Advice

Can a peer on a vpn access servers on another peers network ?

Apologies for this somewhat theoretical question but I recently set up my own home vpn and am trying to better understand how vpn works. Suppose I have a vpn server with two interfaces 10.7.0.0/24 (VPN) and 192.168.1.0/24 (home-network) and the home-network has other services running on different servers not connected to the vpn, is it possible to access them from a peer connected the vpn server ?

Posted Jul 24, 2021, 11:57 PM UTC

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plethoraofprojects•5 yr. ago

Yes, if there is a route from the VPN network to the home network - you should be able to access anything on the LAN. Depends on the VPN server too as to its defaults and firewall rules.

DeadFyre•5 yr. ago

Can a peer on a vpn access servers on another peers network ?

It depends on how the VPN is set up. Most responsible network operators will prevent that, but it's not impossible. Most commercial VPNs like NordVPN or Surfshark shouldn't let that happen, but enterprises routinely set up VPNs to allow two private networks to communicate with each other over an encrypted tunnel. So the technology definitely supports it.

This is actually one of the reasons I don't recommend commercial VPNs to people: You're not actually making yourself any more secure, you're just changing who you trust, and in so doing, exposing yourself to more risk via your VPN provider, should they prove unworthy of that trust. A regular web user using HTTPS already has an encrypted connection to the sites they visit. And unless you're prepared to visit every site over VPN in incognito mode, you'll still be identifiable to the sites you're using, because they require cookies to function properly.