Even though its name evokes Nordic countries, NordVPN is based in Panama, a relatively small country that links Central and South America. The fact that NordVPN selected Panama as its base is good news for its users for one very important reason: Panama is one of the most VPN-friendly countries in the world.

For starters, the country doesn’t participate in the Five Eyes or Fourteen Eyes alliances, both of which are intelligence alliances whose members include the United States, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Canada, Australia, and other countries. The members of these alliances have agreed to share information between one another, and we know—thanks to documents leaked by Edward Snowden—that intentionally spying on one another's citizens and sharing their findings.

Furthermore, Panama also doesn’t have any data retention laws, so NordVPN isn’t obliged to store user activity logs, which the company never does, as it proved by voluntarily undergoing an industry-first audit of its no-logs policy. The audit was performed by one of the largest and most respected auditing firms in the world, and the full audit report is now available to all NordVPN subscribers.

Since its first release in 2014, Amazon Fire TV Stick, better known simply as Firestick, has become a popular choice in the media streaming community, offering impressive capabilities in a dongle form factor that plugs directly into an HDMI port. The one feature the Firestick doesn’t have, however, is a native VPN client that would allow its users to browse the web and stream online content without the possibility of being snooped on.

Fortunately, this problem can be easily fixed with the official NordVPN app for Amazon Fire devices, which is available in the Amazon Appstore. The app is completely free, and it provides access to 5,000+ VPN servers in more than 60 countries. To install it, simply:

• ● Turn on your Firestick.

• ● Search “NordVPN.”

• ● Install it just like you would any other app.

Unless your internet connection is very slow, the installation shouldn’t take more than a couple of seconds because the NordVPN app is very small. After the installation finishes, launch the app by selecting the Open option. Choose Log In and enter your NordVPN username and password to log in to the app. You can now either tell the app to automatically connect you to a recommended server or manually select any server you want.

To understand how NordVPN works, you must first understand how a virtual private network (VPN) hides your online activity from unauthorized third parties. When you establish a VPN connection, your internet traffic gets redirected through an encrypted tunnel to a remote VPN server. The server then forwards your traffic to the target server, be it a web server or mail server.

From the point of view of the target server, the request seems to be coming directly from the VPN server. And since reputable VPN providers like NordVPN don’t keep any activity logs, it’s virtually impossible to trace the request back to its origin—you.

NordVPN has made the entire process of connecting to a remote VPN server remarkably easy by providing its users with a convenient client that allows them to connect over 5,700 NordVPN servers in 60 countries with a few simple clicks. If you wanted to, you could use NordVPN to make it seems as if you were located in the United States or Japan, even if you’re really located in a completely different part of the world.