How to: Run VPN on VirtualBox with Linux (for P2P specifically)

[beowolve 0]

This post is to outline how to setup a P2P client in a VM while using AirVPN. I did this because I only use my VPN when I am doing P2P downloading and uploading. Other than that, I just want to use my normal internet. There are some topics here about traffic splitting, and a bunch of other stuff with routing tables. To be honest, that seems a tad complicated for this. You can most likely do this with any OS in a VM, but I used linux because it is light weight and free. So let's get started.

 

You will need:

* A copy of VirtualBox

* A copy of a linux distro (I am using Ubuntu 14.04)

* 10 GB of local space

* A destination drive with lots of space for your P2P client of choice (I am using Deluge)

 

Before going forward, I am not walking anyone through how to install Linux. You can setup VirtualBox and Linux on your own, there are plenty of guides for that.

 

1. Once you have Linux installed in VirtualBox, make sure to mount and install the Guest Additions CD. This is important so you can get native resolution, but also so that you can share your other drives in your computer with your VM.

2. Open up a terminal window and run 

sudo apt-get install openvpn

We will need this for later when we are connecting to our VPN configuration.

3. Download your P2P client of choice. Like I said earlier, I am using Deluge.

4. Once you have a client you want, you need to choose a port that we are going to use for forwarding. Once you have chosen your port, make sure you set it in your client, and you go to your Client Area here on the AirVPN website and forward it.

5. Generate your config for your VPN. https://airvpn.org/generator/

6. Once you have saved your VPN file, open it up in your text editor of choice (gedit is fine for this) and add the following three lines:

 

script-security 2
up /etc/openvpn/update-resolve-conf
down /etc/openvpn/update-resolve-conf

 

They should go before the <ca> line in the file. Save this and close the file.

7. Once you have that all set, you can open up a terminal and connect to your vpn. just run:

 

sudo openvpn yourAirVPNConf.opvn

 

8. You can now navigate to http://www.whatsmyip.org and verify your IP is correct. You can also go to http://www.canyouseeme.org to verify the port you forwarded is open.

 

Once you have that, you can start downloading whatever you want through your P2P client. You can also mount a Data drive from your Host OS so that you can download to a larger disk. Beware that the latency may cause the client to crash if you have too many connections. This now leaves you free to browser your normal web on your Host OS, and access your VPN on the Linux OS whenever you need to.