[GalakFyarr]

yomacdaddy, on 20 March 2012 - 02:03 PM, said:

GalakFyarr ,

I don't understand your issue. Is it that you think the cost is too high in general and would like to see a service like this charge a lower amount? Or, do you think this company is charging way more than other similar companies. I do not use the service. But, it does not appear that there have been any comments comparing costs of similar service. Is Cloak out of line?

No, my "issue" is with the fact the service is advertised as "free" , while this free option is completely useless to any user.

[luomat]

GalakFyarr, on 21 March 2012 - 12:19 AM, said:

yomacdaddy, on 20 March 2012 - 02:03 PM, said:

GalakFyarr ,

I don't understand your issue. Is it that you think the cost is too high in general and would like to see a service like this charge a lower amount? Or, do you think this company is charging way more than other similar companies. I do not use the service. But, it does not appear that there have been any comments comparing costs of similar service. Is Cloak out of line?

No, my "issue" is with the fact the service is advertised as "free" , while this free option is completely useless to any user.

Your definition of "any user" is pretty weak.

The entire article makes it clear this app is primarily of use for people who have secured Wi-Fi connections at work/home, but who sometimes find themselves venturing out into The World where unsecured Wi-Fi is more common.

Stuck waiting at the car repair shop with a Wi-Fi system which says "linksys" because someone took it out of the box and plugged it into the wall? Use Cloak while you get the oil changed.

Those sort of light, occasional use scenarios are extremely common.

If you're going to Starbucks for 4 hours a day while sucking off their Wi-Fi (or the library because it's chapter than Starbucks) then no, this won't work well for you.

If you've been on the Internet for more then 12 minutes, you should be familiar with tiered levels of service which start at free to give people an introduction to the service and let them demo it, and then if they like it and use it more, THEN they can pay for it.

The idea that this is a novel concept is as absurd as downloading a free game from the App Store and being surprised it has ads in it. "But it said free!"

[snapjack]

No torrents allowed? WT...

[David Chartier]

GalakFyarr, on 20 March 2012 - 01:46 PM, said:

It'd be the same thing if dropbox's free option was 1GB maximum server space, and you can only upload files of maximum 25MB large. And you can only upload 1 file every month. Oh, but the app is free! Did we mention the 20$ upgrade?

The free period is a trial to let you get to know the service, not an indefinite freemium period like Flickr offers its customers. Cloak's approach is more like test driving a car. You don't get to use the car for 2 hours a day indefinitely; you drive it for a brief, singular chunk of time to decide if you like it.

And the service isn't "advertised as free." The utility itself is free—that's fact, not misleading. Should I have written that the app costs money so that you'd be surprised once you discover on your own that it is, in fact, not? No, I shouldn't have.

If you spend a lot of time on public networks, it's not a bad idea to encrypt your traffic and protect your sensitive information and credentials. Services for doing that cost money to run. Cloak is one of the simplest solutions I've ever seen for end-users, and its fees are quite reasonable.

[GalakFyarr]

David Chartier, on 21 March 2012 - 08:38 AM, said:

GalakFyarr, on 20 March 2012 - 01:46 PM, said:

It'd be the same thing if dropbox's free option was 1GB maximum server space, and you can only upload files of maximum 25MB large. And you can only upload 1 file every month. Oh, but the app is free! Did we mention the 20$ upgrade?

The free period is a trial to let you get to know the service, not an indefinite freemium period like Flickr offers its customers. Cloak's approach is more like test driving a car. You don't get to use the car for 2 hours a day indefinitely; you drive it for a brief, singular chunk of time to decide if you like it.

And the service isn't "advertised as free." The utility itself is free—that's fact, not misleading. Should I have written that the app costs money so that you'd be surprised once you discover on your own that it is, in fact, not? No, I shouldn't have.

If you spend a lot of time on public networks, it's not a bad idea to encrypt your traffic and protect your sensitive information and credentials. Services for doing that cost money to run. Cloak is one of the simplest solutions I've ever seen for end-users, and its fees are quite reasonable.

I didn't mean to say Cloak's prices are overpriced, the only problem I have is with the ridiculous restriction on the trial. 33MB or 4 minutes / day is absolutely nothing at all, whatever your activities on the internet would be. How are we supposed to get to know the service and the application with so little time to use it? If I'm going to pay for an online service, I'd like to know first it works just the way I want. if I have to wait 30 days because I tested the service for just 2 hours, sorry, no thanks.

So sure the application is free, but how is that an advantage? Can the application be used for other VPN services? As far as I can tell from the article, I don't think so. So this application is not actually free, it's just part of the fee you pay for the service. It's exactly the same as a MacBook's power adaptor, you "think" you pay only for your laptop, but in fact you pay for everything included in the box.

I understand there have to be limits for the free users, but this is basically useless unless you pay. It'd be more interesting to be able to use the service fully and for free for a set amount of days (one week?) (and of course a REALISTIC limit of data per day, to avoid abuse) , then if you really want to use Cloak, you pay. if you don't, you simply uninstall Cloak, and you're done with it.

I'll repeat my Dropbox comparison: while Dropbox has a limit of 2GB for a free account, 2GB is still something you can work with (not to mention Dropbox actually gives a LOT of ways to expand this free space). If Dropbox had put the limit on 100MB, then I'd never even try Dropbox out.

This post has been edited by GalakFyarr: 21 March 2012 - 10:19 AM

[PRORAIN]

Low space but a great handy little app, something i have been worrying about for a while. I have been trying to find a great mac app that encrypts, changes as well i guess, I.S.P's and internet traffic in general, i don't really know a lot - or if it is even legal - if Macworld did an article on this it would be very informative i am sure. Thanks for the great review, in this day and age nothing is private - especially when it comes to the internet - there is not a lot of information on how to protect yourself - especially in simple words that people who are not pro users but do know what they are doing, can understand.

I would love to see more articles like this.
Rain.

[Dan Frakes]

GalakFyarr, on 21 March 2012 - 10:17 AM, said:

So sure the application is free, but how is that an advantage? Can the application be used for other VPN services? As far as I can tell from the article, I don't think so. So this application is not actually free, it's just part of the fee you pay for the service. It's exactly the same as a MacBook's power adaptor, you "think" you pay only for your laptop, but in fact you pay for everything included in the box.

I think you're conflating the utility and the service. The service, which isn't being reviewed here, is a standard VPN service which, like most reputable VPN services, charges a fee if you use it more than occasionally. (FWIW, I think a good number of people could get by with 1GB or 2 hours per month, if they mainly need a VPN occasionally and briefly—such as when, as someone else noted, they're temporarily at the mechanic or somewhere else with an unprotected network.)

The utility, which is free, is what's being reviewed here. The utility's appeal is that you simply launch it and everything is automatic—configuration, connection, etc. The utility watches for unsecured Wi-Fi networks, and if you connect to one, the utility automatically activates the VPN.

To me, the biggest drawback to the Cloak app is that it doesn't work with other VPN services. Based on David's review, it looks like a killer utility for those who don't want to—or know how to—deal with the usual hassles of setting up and using a VPN service.

[AlbertThiel]

What is Cloak going to do with the usage data it accumulates? Is there a privacy statement that none of it will bd used for any purposes other than providing security when logging on to a non password protected wi-fi network? I have not seen it but it may exist.

[JoshuaRuybal]

I understand why this would be appealing, but I'm happy with WiTopia. It's a little bit of setup, but afterward I never have to deal with a limit.

At ~$5.70 it's cheaper than Cloak as well.

[molex]

GalakFyarr, on 21 March 2012 - 12:19 AM, said:

No, my "issue" is with the fact the service is advertised as "free" , while this free option is completely useless to any user.

I love when people make blanket statements about everyone else in the world when they clearly only are referring to themselves.

I use a free cloak account and I find it quite useful. I rarely need a VPN, but once in a while I do... so the free option is perfect for me.

Your statement is "...this free option is completely useless to any user." I am a cloak user, and the free option is NOT useless to me. That instantly renders your statement incorrect, oops!

[molex]

JoshuaRuybal, on 22 March 2012 - 07:10 AM, said:

I understand why this would be appealing, but I'm happy with WiTopia. It's a little bit of setup, but afterward I never have to deal with a limit.

At ~$5.70 it's cheaper than Cloak as well.

If you're using a VPN regularly you're probably right.

But for someone like me Cloak is perfect. I rarely need a VPN, so paying a yearly fee for something I might use twice a year isn't sensible. Also WiTopia setup is a real hassle to set up and figure out, and then the one or two times a year I need to use it it never works right... I forgot the password, I forgot to order another year of service, etc. etc. So I end up spending an hour figuring out WiTopia again so I can do 15 minutes of work on a public hotspot? Not worth it.

[markhennon]

I want to know what happens when I inadvertently go over the 1 GB or two hours. Do they bill me $8 for that month?

[molex]

molex, on 22 March 2012 - 07:19 AM, said:

...then the one or two times a year I need to use it it never works right... I forgot the password, I forgot to order another year of service, etc. etc.

Replying to myself LOL

To wit: Out of curiosity I just went and tried to startup my WiTopia account on my iPhone, which I haven't used in months. Of course the connection was denied, my account is no longer working, whatever. Immediate fail.

I then selected Cloak as my VPN, turned on the VPN slider switch and 10 seconds later I'm surfing through VPN, zero set up zero hassles.

For the advanced or frequent user services like WiTopia are probably the way to go, but for a guy like me who just wants to sit at Starbucks once in a while and check my account balances and do some email without worrying about local network safety Cloak is a far better option.

[pntucker]

GalakFyarr, on 20 March 2012 - 11:00 AM, said:

1GB a month? is that a joke? 33MB (if we say 1GB = 1000MB) per day is NOTHING.

2 hours a month? IS THAT A JOKE? That's 4 minutes per day!?

This app is NOT free.

\
mac users can try opendns encrypt -for real free