If you want to watch pornography anonymously, there are a few steps you can take to enhance your privacy:
- Use a VPN.
- Browse in incognito mode.
- Use reliable antivirus software.
- Don’t log into any accounts before opening a porn site.
- Use anti-tracking browser extensions.
Of these steps, the first is arguably the most important. A VPN not only hides your browsing activity, but also allows you to circumvent porn censorship. We recommend using NordVPN because of its unblocking features and its reasonable price tag.
Do you want to learn more about watching porn anonymously and the risks of watching porn online? Check out our complete article below.
About 58% of Americans have reported watching porn at least once in their lives. Despite this popularity, plenty of people wish to hide their porn consumption. Others, meanwhile, struggle to circumvent government blocks on porn sites. Is it possible to watch porn online without anyone knowing, including your internet service provider?
In this article, we’ll discuss how to watch porn online anonymously. First, we’ll go over the tools and methods you can use to protect your privacy while streaming adult content. Then, we’ll go over the privacy and safety risks of watching porn online.
How to Watch Porn Anonymously
In this section, we’ll discuss methods and tools for watching porn anonymously and safely.
1. Use a VPN to watch porn anonymously
A VPN is a privacy and cybersecurity tool that hides your online identity by masking your real IP address and encrypting your traffic. It’s a tried and tested way of hiding your online activity.
A virtual private network may be the solution you’re looking for in the following cases:
- When porn sites are banned in your country — VPNs can spoof your location by providing you with an IP address from a different country. This allows you to bypass geoblocks and firewalls.
- When you need to connect to public Wi-Fi — Accessing porn websites using a hotel’s Wi-Fi can get you banned from using the network. When you use a VPN, the Wi-FI network’s admin can’t see which websites you’re visiting, so you’re free to watch porn videos if you wish.
- When your ISP is throttling your bandwidth — When your ISP intentionally slows down your internet speed because of “too much data use,” you can use a VPN to hide your activities from them. Bandwidth throttling isn’t just used against porn viewing. Torrenters and streamers are often victims of this violation, as well.
We’ve reviewed dozens of VPNs on this website to help you pick a VPN that works for you. For a quick recommendation: NordVPN consistently tops our VPN tests and offers a 30-day money-back guarantee so you can test the service for free.
- Fast and large worldwide network of VPN servers
- No logs, perfect for privacy
- Great for streaming sports and Netflix
2. Browse in incognito mode when watching porn
The main advantage of using incognito mode is you’re not storing your browsing history on your device. If you share a device with someone else, incognito mode will protect your privacy from those people.
Moreover, starting a new session in incognito mode means you won’t have to deal with the cookies from your previous non-incognito browsing sessions. You’ll also be logged out of any accounts. Being logged out is ideal because it limits third parties from being able to track you online.
However, incognito mode won’t hide your IP address or browser activity from third parties, such as internet service providers. We recommend using incognito mode on top of using a reliable VPN.
3. Use a good antivirus to prevent malware
Because of their popularity, porn sites are frequently used to distribute potentially dangerous malware, such as Trojans, RATs, spyware, adware, and others. There are some huge, well-established porn sites out there that you can expect to be safe. However, there are hundreds of smaller porn sites that come and go.
Many porn sites, especially unreliable ones, have tons of pop-up ads. Often when such an ad opens, a malicious download is initiated at the same time. These unauthorized downloads on your part are called drive-by downloads.
A good antivirus solution will quickly recognize these dangerous pages and files before they can harm your system, provided you choose a solid antivirus app with good real-time detection. That’s why we strongly recommend Norton 360, the leading antivirus in our rigorous tests.
Norton 360 provides comprehensive security for Windows and Mac devices partnered with additional privacy and security features. You get a password manager, VPN, dark web monitor, and secure cloud storage.
4. Don’t log into any accounts before visiting a porn site
Once you log into any account, you’ve basically given up a large part of your privacy. After all, you’re now linking an account to your online activity. Many types of accounts, such as many Google accounts, contain personal information about their users. This is even more problematic.
Some online services, such as Google, gather a lot of user information. As such, we strongly recommend that you don’t sign into your Google account before navigating to a porn site.
We also advise against creating and logging into an account on a porn site. Porn sites also collect user data. Popular porn site PornHub, for instance, gathers the following information on people that have an account:
- Contact Information: Your username and email address.
- Payment and Commercial Information: Information about your payment method, such as your credit card and any payments you make or receive
- User Submitted Personal Information: Your date of birth, gender, video preferences, and other account information.
- Identifiers and Biometric Information: Data to prove your identity, including government-issued photo identification and biometric information, if you use certain features that require this, such as the Model Partner Progam.
- User Contributions, including audio/video files, if you provide these.
In short, online services gather plenty of information on you if you register or log into an account. We strongly recommend avoiding logging into any accounts if you want to watch porn privately.
5. Use anti-tracking browser extensions
Even if you follow all the security precautions above, you still need to take into consideration cookies and trackers.
Starting a new incognito session means you are free of cookies. However, continued use of that session will eventually generate cookies. Do you need to open a new incognito browser after every website you visit or after every video you watch?
Fortunately, there’s an easy solution. There are some handy browser extensions that greatly increase your privacy by blocking ads, cookies, and tracking scripts. These are some of our favorite free anti-tracker extensions:
- uBlock Origin
- Adblock Plus
- Privacy Badger
- Ghostery
The Best VPN for Porn: Our Top 3 Picks
We’ve made a selection of a couple of trustworthy, fast VPN services that are excellent for watching porn anonymously. These providers use secure encryption (256-bit AES) along with safe protocols such as OpenVPN and Wireguard and don’t keep activity logs.
Moreover, these VPNs are great for unblocking porn sites in countries where these are censored. Here’s our list of the three best VPNs for watching porn anonymously.
1. NordVPN: The best porn VPN for anonymous streaming
NordVPN is our top-ranking VPN because of its speed, security and privacy features, customer service, and user experience. It excels at everything you need a VPN for, such as making sure you don’t have to wait endlessly for videos to buffer, thanks to its solid speeds.
Here are just some of the features offered by NordVPN:
- Obfuscated servers help you circumvent some of the fiercest censorship and VPN blocks in any region or country. These servers were created specifically to hide the fact that you’re using a VPN.
- Over 5,400 servers to choose from means you don’t run the risk of server congestion.
- Threat Protection prevents you from downloading infected files or visiting malicious websites.
NordVPN allows you to protect up to six devices at the same time with just one VPN subscription. What’s more, its subscriptions are priced reasonably, and you get 30 days to claim your money back after you’ve tried the service.
- Fast and large worldwide network of VPN servers
- No logs, perfect for privacy
- Great for streaming sports and Netflix
2. Surfshark: The cheapest VPN for watching porn safely
Surfshark offers the complete package. Even better, it does so at one of the cheapest price points of any premium VPN provider. Its blazing streaming speeds and high level of privacy will help you watch your favorite adult videos anonymously and without endless loading.
Here are just some of the great benefits that Surfshark offers:
- IP camouflaging hides your VPN use from your internet service provider.
- Fast connections allow you to watch your favorite videos privately and without long loading times.
- Dynamic MultiHop lets you connect to two servers so you can double your privacy and security.
Surfshark allows you to protect and anonymize all of your devices. That’s right: Surfshark doesn’t have a connection limit! You can use Surfshark’s cheap subscription to watch adult content on as many devices as you’d like. Even better, if you’re not satisfied (which we highly doubt), you can get your money back within 30 days.
3. ProtonVPN: Free VPN for watching porn anonymously
Another good pick to protect your privacy while watching porn is ProtonVPN. This provider’s major advantage is that it offers a free version. ProtonVPN’s free version will protect one device for an unlimited time, no bandwidth limit. This provider is one of the very few free VPNs that offer unlimited data and a no-logs policy.
Here are some ProtonVPN features that make it a great choice for watching porn anonymously:
- Unlimited data allows you to watch any amount of porn you want.
- Free servers in the US, Japan, and the Netherlands provide decent connections worldwide.
- Smart Protocol and Alternative Routing features help you circumvent the censorship of porn sites.
Unfortunately, like any free VPN, ProtonVPN does come with some disadvantages: ProntonVPN free only gives you access to three server locations. Moreover, you’ll be sharing the servers at these locations with all other ProtonVPN Free users. This can create serious drops in speed because of high server loads.
To use a VPN without these limits, we suggest opting for ProtonVPN Premium. Alternatively, you can opt for one of the premium providers we mentioned above.
Safety and Privacy Risks of Watching Porn Online
Watching erotic content is normal and widespread — which is why it comes with privacy and security risks. If you’re not careful, your browser history and internet activity could be visible to other people.
Here are some safety and privacy risks associated with watching porn online.
Your private browsing history isn’t completely private
If you don’t take proper precautions, the following parties can see exactly what adult websites you visit and what content you watch:
| Third Party | What Data They See | Solution |
|---|---|---|
| Your network administrator | What websites you visit, the webpage content you view (on HTTP webpages), people you contact over the internet, what apps you have installed, how much time you spend on each app | Use a VPN to hide your online activity, and only visit websites that use HTTPS |
| Your internet service provider | What websites you visit and (if you visit HTTP sites) the specific web pages and any content that’s on them and that you provide | Use a VPN to encrypt your data and DNS requests and avoid visiting HTTP websites |
| Bad actors on the same network (such as hackers) | What websites and web pages (on HTTP sites) you visit and what you do on them | Either avoiding public networks or using an encryption tool such as a VPN or the Tor browser |
| Other parties | What web pages you visited (cookies and trackers) or even how you interact with those pages (browser fingerprinting) | Use browser extensions that block trackers and cookies and take steps to make browser fingerprinting more difficult |
Porn websites experience data breaches, too
If you’re visiting adult websites and those sites experience a data breach, you could be facing some serious consequences.
One of the most high-profile data breaches occurred in 2015 with the online dating service Ashley Madison. Hackers accessed the site’s database and released user information to the public. As a result, millions of cases of infidelity were revealed, along with all sorts of sensitive personal information.
In 2021, webcam porn site MyFreeCams experienced a serious data breach. Allegedly, over 2,000,000 user accounts were compromised.
If a data breach occurs and reveals you’re visiting adult websites, this could have a devastating impact on your reputation and relationships. As a precaution, avoid making accounts on the porn sites you visit. Even if the website suffers a data breach, there won’t be any data on you to share.
You can get malware and viruses from porn sites
Malware can be injected into a porn website by the owner of the site, making such websites dangerous to visit. However, this likely only happens with small porn sites that were specifically created to attack their users.
What’s more likely to happen is that a malicious third party finds a security vulnerability or exploit on the website. They will then abuse this vulnerability and inject malicious scripts into the website’s code.
In any event, visiting such porn sites could infect your system with dangerous malware, such as ransomware, spyware, or browser hijackers.
Many of the dangerous scripts that can infect your device are hidden in malicious ads. If you’re on a porn site that has lots of ads, avoid clicking on them. Better yet, get an ad blocker for your browser so you don’t see ads altogether.
Unfortunately, some scripts can execute themselves without any action from the victim. In this case, malware could download itself onto your device even if you don’t click on any ads. This is also known as a drive-by download.
To protect yourself against malware, we recommend getting reliable antivirus software like Bitdefender. You can also check out our article on the best antivirus solutions to see more options.
Porn Censorship: Is Porn Illegal Where You Live?
In some countries, watching porn is illegal and could get you in serious trouble. In the table below, you’ll find some countries where watching porn is illegal and could get you a fine or worse.
| Countries where porn is illegal | Punishment you could face |
|---|---|
| Indonesia | Although the law is not often enforced, people who download porn could face up to four years in prison. |
| North Korea | A report by Seoul-based Database Centre for North Korean Human Rights (NKDB) suggests porn consumers are “punished with a lifetime term of ‘reform through labor’ or even executed by firing squad.” |
| Oman | Anyone found to use technology to “procure” (obtain) or purchase pornography could be imprisoned between one month and one year. They could also face a fine of 100 to 1000 Omani Rial (about $2500). |
| United Arab Emirates | According to a prominent Emirati law firm, there have been people in the past who were jailed for a month and received a fine for having pornographic DVDs in their possession. |
| Vietnam | The possession of pornography in Vietnam could get you fined or detained. However, if you don’t have pornography in physical form (DVDs, magazines, etc.) on you, it’s unlikely you’ll get in trouble. |
There are also plenty of countries where watching porn might not get you into trouble, but porn sites are censored. In these countries, producing or distributing porn generally may also be illegal.
Other countries where porn is either banned or illegal include:
- Afghanistan
- Belarus
- China
- Iran
- Saudi Arabia
- Thailand
- Turkmenistan
- Yemen
While there’s no ban on accessing porn in the U.S., some states — namely Louisiana and Utah — have enacted legislation that requires users to provide IDs before they can access porn sites. Several other states are considering similar laws.
Final Thoughts: Anonymous Porn Streaming with a VPN
Plenty of people watch porn online these days. However, considering the taboo that still surrounds porn, many prefer to hide their porn consumption. They also want to stay safe while watching porn. Fortunately, there are ways that can help you watch porn safely:
- Use a good VPN (We greatly recommend NordVPN).
- Browse in incognito mode.
- Use solid antivirus software.
- Don’t log into any accounts.
- Use browser extensions that increase your privacy.
If you make sure to take all of the precautions above, you’ll be able to watch porn online anonymously and safely. For more information on safety, check out our other privacy-related articles to make sure your data is yours and yours alone.
- How Does Your Browser Know Your Location and How to Hide It
- The Privacy Risks in User Agreements and Privacy Policies
- Online Anonymity Test: What Data Does Your Device Leak? (Free Tool)
- What is a MAC Address? And Where do I Find Mine?
- Browser Fingerprinting: What Is It and How Can You Prevent It?
Do you have more questions about how to watch porn anonymously? Here are our frequently asked questions.
Just using incognito mode does not ensure that you are anonymous online. By enabling incognito mode, your browser automatically deletes all cookies, and your browsing history isn’t saved to your device. However, your IP address, operating system, and tons of other information can still be viewed by websites and other parties.
To browse and watch porn completely anonymously, you must take these measures:
- Use a VPN.
- Browse in incognito mode.
- Install good antivirus software.
- Don’t log into any accounts before opening a porn site.
- Using anti-tracking browser extensions.
If you want to watch porn anonymously, it’s wise to use a VPN. We also recommend using solid antivirus software. This way, you avoid or mitigate these risks:
- Other parties, such as your ISP, seeing that you are watching porn
- Getting arrested for watching porn in a country where it is illegal
- Contracting a virus or other type of malware from a porn site
