With the internet filled with social media, games, pictures, videos, online betting sites, and much more, it is essential to be present online to promote your brand or simply to exist in the modern sense of the term. Hosting is one of the services that we all need to consider if we want to have our website up online. Some people opt for offshore hosting. Why and what is that?
Meaning
Offshore hosting means that your website or application in its entirety, including all the data by the visitors and users, is stored far away – most likely on another continent. For example, you could be residing in the US and have your website hosted by a company in Sweden.
It is important to note the distinction between free hosting and offshore hosting. Free hosting is, well, free and it comes with a few strings attached regarding what you can use your website or app for, as well as what kind of content you can place online. Offshore hosting isn’t free, but it can be very affordable when compared to some of the local hosting options.
Why Use It?
There are many reasons why someone would choose to have their website’s data stored in another country. Free speech is one of the most common reasons, as it is difficult or impossible for some people to express their social or political opinions online or in public without repercussions. This is where offshore hosting comes to help, as it is very hard to shut down a site in another country by your country’s authorities – it is out of their jurisdiction. Sometimes, it is even difficult to contact the company in charge in the first place.
Sadly, this also means that offshore hosting opens a pathway to all kinds of semi-legal and illegal practices, at least in the homeland of the website’s owner. For example, let’s say that someone is planning on running an online gaming site or a porn site and such practice is illegal in their country. In order to pursue their interests and business enterprises, people opt for the offshore option in order to prevent their government from legally shutting their business down. This is why we see an increasing number of regulations regarding sites that are banned or frowned upon.
It also means that people can share copyrighted material online with little worry about facing legal actions. Downloading the latest movies, books, music, and games without paying for them is relatively easy when you share files on servers that are hard to track or simply deny access to your home country.
Virtual Private Server Hosting
There is a type of hosting that is particularly popular with the people looking to protect their privacy for whatever reason and it combines well with offshore hosting. We are talking about VPS hosting, or virtual private server hosting. A physical server is divided into several virtual servers. Each of these servers has its own IP address, making it nearly impossible to track.