After Google and Apple, Microsoft decided to offer a VPN service to its users – it will be available for free to all users of the Edge browser.

According to the information published on the support page, the name of the VPN service was Microsoft Edge Secure Network and its provider was Cloudflare. As with Apple’s iCloud Private Relay, Microsoft does not call its novelty a VPN service, although it offers the same features. Microsoft Edge Secure Network is now available in a previous version, but with the release, Edge users will get 1GB of free traffic per month for each Microsoft account.

Rather than develop a VPN service on its own, Microsoft enlisted the support of its partner Cloudflare. Users were promised to collect only diagnostic data and delete it every 25 hours. The service encrypts the user’s connection to protect their traffic from monitoring and online threats and does not allow even ISPs to collect data. As a result, it is much more difficult to create a user’s advertising profile by specialist companies engaged in targeted advertising.

Microsoft Edge Secure Network probably won’t let users choose VPN servers to connect to to bypass geo-blocking – the support page says that “the feature will let you see a virtual IP address that masks your IP and replaces your location with a similar regional address.” To mask it, you will have to use paid services.