@mrb96 If this is indeed censorship blocking, you might read the first several sections of the year-old article at https://www.addictivetips.com/vpn/iran-vpn/ to get a better idea of what you're facing. However, given the dynamic nature of how censors operate, there's no guarantee the VPN recommendations listed in that article are still effective. The unfortunate reality is that all VPN connections from a user must first contact the IP of the VPN, which leaves a clear blocking target (either directly at IP level or indirectly by DNS-blocking) for the determined censor. A censorship agency can easily figure out all the user-connection IP addresses used by a VPN operator, if only by installing the VPN products and patiently sniffing the resulting packet traffic. In a truly free world, things might be different, but sadly that's not the way it currently is.

@crisalide said in Has Opera Turbo been killed?:

... Opera Turbo, especially for those who have a consumer connection, was an essential function, one of those that should never be touched, so I don't understand the logic behind this decision.

I'm not an Opera employee, but my best guess is it was a business cost decision, perhaps accelerated by the recent Opera ownership change. Turbo was not a strictly browser-code feature as much as it was a proxy-like filter residing on servers operated by Opera (which compressed the data coming back from a visited website - especially images - thereby reducing the data package size going to the user). So two cost-reduction possibilities present themselves: either it was becoming too expensive to maintain the Turbo browser code in light of the continual chromium engine updates or/and it was becoming too expensive (or bandwidth-competitive) to maintain the proxy-like server network. My personal guess is the latter to be more likely contributor.

@joe232 Several possibilities exist: First, are you able to verify your ISP or a national censor isn't blocking VPN IPs or headers? Second, are you sure your antivirus isn't blocking or interfering with VPN/proxy connections? Third, are you sure your Windows installations are set up to allow VPN/proxy connections? Fourth, are the https certificates up to date on your Windows systems?

In viewing the Vanguard.com URL you provided on my Opera 60.0.3255.27 on Win10-1803, I'm unable to confirm your problem on the 'publicly'-available links on that Vanguard page. Since I'm no longer a Vanguard customer, I'm unable to try any pages subsequent to log-in. In other words, all the public pages I tried opened fine, including their animations. Are you using any extensions with Opera, particularly an adblocking/privacy extension?

@rekrul As I noted earlier, you're trying to use an Opera version that's outdated by 22 subsequent versions, installed under a system OS that has had no mainstream maker 'feature' support for 9 years and no security support for 5 years. Many technical things, especially online things, change at a rapid pace and for reasons that are often complex and inter-related: security discoveries/development, hardware evolution, software design practices/mechanisms, trends in dominant user-preferences, etc. While some of the technological change may indeed only be "for change's sake", much of it comes from those far more foundational reasons. As time goes by, fewer and fewer companies and individuals have reason to remain conversant with obsolete program details and limitations, let alone expend their resources trying to provide user support in increasingly rare situations.

Different software developers employ differing technologies and architectures for seemingly similar products (eg: browsers), and certain of those technologies may be more robust in supporting some technological changes while perhaps suffering greater impairment in other change areas when compared with similar products, particularly once they move into obsolescence. Some makers may even choose to support their products over much longer time-frames than others, but for reasons that matter to them. Hence, whether browser A works the same way as browser B on an aging system facing the latest web environment usually involve myriad factors that make it increasingly difficult to find someone with the intimate knowledge to help unravel them.

Over the years, I've 'flown' a number of computer systems deeply "into the ground" via aging/obsolescence. The path for each has always unfolded precisely along the lines of what you're experiencing: similar software on such a system start behaving differently from one another, certain functionality abruptly becomes sporadic - especially in online environments, maker support evaporates, compatible ancillary software and tools become unavailable, knowledgeable similar users disappear, questions increasingly remain unanswered, and unresolved problems accumulate. To the extent that one can live with the growing limitations and problems, they can continue using such a system online; but the point is eventually reached where the cumulative frustrations, limitations, and security risks simply can no longer be ignored. At that point, the system has to be taken offline for its remaining lifespan (which might actually be quite long if the computer is mainly being used as a tool for computation, etc). Only the individual user himself can make such a determination, but they do need to understand and accept the swelling costs of continuing in growing obsolescence.

The VPN first appeared in Opera at version 38, and was operated through SurfEasy's VPN servers, which company Opera had just acquired.

The VPN/proxy subject can get complicated, since there are a fair variety of protocols and encryption levels/features that can be employed in combination, depending on what the service provider offers and the user chooses to do. There are multiple tradeoffs of security, speed, system compatibility, and ease-of-use with the different protocols and combinations.

Suffice it to say that a proxy is simply a server that stands in the path between a user's system and a target website. If the proxy is 'anonymous', it provides the website with the server's IP address rather than the user's IP, which hides the user from the website (at least in terms of the user's IP address). If the proxy uses traffic encryption (typically https) from the user to the proxy server, the website IP the user is seeking will also be encrypted into the traffic moving from his system to the proxy server's IP, and thus will be hidden from prying eyes at that end of the path. Likewise, if traffic encryption is employed by the proxy server, the traffic content coming back from the website will also be encrypted on its way down to the user.

A true VPN may employ a variety of transport protocols (UDP, TCP, L2TP, PPTP) along with IPSEC, OpenVPN, etc. and various encryption protocols. It also functions much like a proxy, but with more extensive packet encryption and tunneling capability, usually needing to utilize a non-http/https port through the user's firewall. Consequently, system provision may have to be made for that (in the firewall and antimalware programs). The tradeoffs between the various VPN protocols have to do with traffic speed, efficiency, packet reassembly, levels/layering of packet encryption, complexity of setup, etc.

In general, a well-set-up, true VPN will offer more robust and flexible security against traffic snooping than an anonymous proxy. However, it's important to realize that the user's employment of either a proxy or true VPN is itself detectable via traffic sniffing of the proxy/VPN IP affixed to the data packets from the user to the proxy/VPN server... that in itself may constitute a 'red flag' to snoopers, who may then either apply deeper attempts at cracking or place the user on a "watch" list.

Opera's 'VPN' indeed acts as an anonymous proxy, which is sufficient for most 'ordinary' anonymous web browsing. However, where undesired detection of the user's browsing presents a critical risk to the user, they would probably be better served with a full-blown VPN at maximum security or with encrypted usage of BitTorrent. Even then, there will exist the vulnerability that their use of the VPN or BitTorrent will be detected, and there also remains a finite risk of cracking of the traffic regardless. This is why I stressed the caveats earlier that in such cases a user absolutely must understand the tradeoffs and risks in depth (not just based on advertising claims), and all that goes well beyond the level of these forums.

@s91199119 What matters to most VPN users regarding their VPN's exit IP is the (in)accuracy of the IP's purported location in terms of where the user is actually located and the full hiding of their own IP. In order to create a working connection with a website, some kind of 'listed' IP address must be applied to the traffic transiting the VPN's exit server to/from the target website. That listed IP address will tell the Internet traffic relays where to route return traffic so that it finds its way back to the VPN server and then on to the user. In the case of Opera and ordinary VPNs, the 'listed' IP will simply trace back to the directory-listed geolocation of the VPN's exit server and no further.

Hence an Opera VPN user in Tokyo with traffic exiting a VPN server physically located and listed in IP directories as located in Berlin would show up in analysis as having an IP from somewhere roughly within 50 miles or so of Berlin. Analysis of those IP details in a directory-listing would only allow the exit traffic to be traced to an Opera server, which reveals nothing of the actual user. However, it must always be understood (if a user is concerned about the 'location' being accurately traced back to the user's actual location), there are other means for the targeted website only to use WebRTC or site JavaScripting to analyze details from the visiting user's computer during the traffic-stream handshaking to guess more accurately the user's true location. If the traffic stream is encrypted (https), those handshaking details wouldn't, of course, be readable by anyone other than the target website.

Regarding 'kill switches' and the like, apart from @yanta's settings/3rd-party good advice above, this rapidly shifts into the realm of the nature of the traffic one is trying to protect and the personal consequences of its disclosure. For every privacy-protection mechanism, there is a snooping countermeasure of some kind, either real or potential. Each given situation depends on the degree of technical determination on the part of the user and of the censor/snooper. I suggest you read a post I made in another thread here: https://forums.opera.com/post/166732

@s91199119 With certain non-Opera VPNs, such a message can appear from the computer's VPN client that simply means you're no longer successfully connected through the VPN's server, hence any Internet connections you make would not be protected/hidden through the VPN and would reveal your normal IP to snooping. I've never heard of that occurring with Opera's VPN client, which is built into the browser itself and, if unable to successfully connect, simply messages that its either trying to connect or is unable to connect to the VPN. Are you instead actually using a VPN extension or a computer-level VPN?

@mcmahon85 Also, from where was that version downloaded and installed (the one without VPN)?