You might know what a virtual private network (VPN) is, but the odds of you actually using one are low. You really should be using a VPN -- ultimately, you may end up seeing it as just as vital as your internet connection. We'll tell you why, explain how to choose a VPN provider and list five that are worth considering.

The European Commission paid €360,000 ($541,980) for a study on how piracy impacts the sales of copyrighted music, books, video games and movies. But the EU never shared the report -- possibly because it determined that there is no evidence that piracy is a major problem.

Dear Lifehacker, Like thousands of my fellow countrymen, I will be watching Game Of Thrones via illegal means this year. I refuse to be locked into a costly Foxtel contract for one show and the Blu-rays don't come out for ages. I feel it's a justifiable crime.

With that said, I'm sure the law probably doesn't agree, which brings me to my question. In respect to Australia's new anti-piracy laws, will anything bad happen to me if I dodge Foxtel this year? Or do the powers-that-be remain as toothless as before? Should I be worried?

Bittorrent users are looking for ways to hide their identities from the outside world. Even the less concerned among them are now thinking about their privacy as the threat of online surveillance grows, and Australian ISPs are blocking torrent sites left right and centre. So once you do get your hands on those torrents, how do you download them without broadcasting your actions to the world?

Hot on the heels of Village Roadshow's recent legal shenanigans, the torrent site KickassTorrents has come back online. Rather than a copycat (or malware-infested honeypot), this site reportedly has the original team behind it, though they've had to start from scratch in terms of content.

The alleged owner of Kickass Torrents (KAT) has been arrested for copyright infringement with all site domains seized by US authorities. The upshot of this is that the site is down; possibly for good.

Windows: Transmission is one of our favourite BitTorrent clients that has unfortunately been limited to Mac and Linux users for a long time. Now, it's finally available for Windows.

Court documents have revealed the sites and services that Foxtel and Village Roadshow are seeking to block in Australia under tough new anti-piracy laws. The extensive hit list includes multiple file-sharing sites and video streaming service Solar Movie. Here are all the sites that have been marked for death.

Popcorn Time may be dead, but its spirit lives on. Torrents Time is a browser plugin developed by the team behind a fork of Popcorn Time that allows you to stream torrents directly in your browser.

Popular torrent aggregator Kickass Torrents appears to have fallen foul of Mozilla and Google, with the site now flagged as suspicious by both companies.

Dear Lifehacker, The other day my friend started downloading a torrent of Game Of Thrones on my home computer. I discovered this a few minutes into the download and quickly deleted it. Can I still be fined? Technically I didn't download anything.

Yesterday, the Australian Senate passed legislation which will require ISPs to block sites that are found by a court to enable piracy. Just how soon will that happen and what effect will it have?

Hey Lifehacker, after all the buzz about Dallas Buyers Club and the related court decision it would seem to me that the infringement would be for distributing copies. If this is the case would Usenet users be somewhat in the clear since it's purely downloads?

The Netflix of movie torrents, Popcorn Time, has always been an easy way to stream movies -- and now you can do it right from your browser, no extra software required.

BitTorrent is a great way to transfer and share large files, but it's only as convenient and efficient as the application you use to seed and download them. This week, we're looking at five of the best BitTorrent clients, based on your nominations.

Hey Lifehacker, I refuse to join Foxtel just for Game Of Thrones so I'm downloading Season 5 via Kickass Torrents and will buy the Blu-ray when it comes out. However, with all the legal activity around Dallas Buyers Club I'm starting to really worry. What might happen to me if I'm caught? And what can I do to cover my tracks?

iOS/Mac: In an odd move, the original version of the non-jailbreak version of Popcorn Time required a Windows computer to install it. Thankfully, Mac users can get in on the fun now with a new Mac installer.

Many millions of people throughout the world will illegally download the fifth season of Game of Thrones, launched this week by HBO. Legally speaking, what they will be doing is a violation of intellectual property rights, or "piracy". But will they be doing anything morally wrong?

iOS: Popcorn Time, the movie streaming app that uses torrents to serve up movies as streams, is now available on iOS and you don't need a jailbreak to use it.