Cambodia is a country located in the southern section of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. There is evidence of human activity dating back to the Hoabinhian culture (12,000 BC – 10,000 BC) in that region, and it is some of the most ancient evidence we have of civilization. That said, this country of just over 15.4 million has been in turmoil almost since it gained full independence from France in 1953. Let’s take a look at some of the best VPNs for Cambodia.
| Rank | VPN Service | Our Score | Server Locations | Visit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  | 9.8 | 160 |  |
| 2 |  | 9.4 | 87 | |
| 3 |  | 9.2 | 95 | |
| 4 |  | 9.0 | 110 | |
| 5 |  | 8.8 | 73 | |
Until recently, Cambodia had no specific rules regarding online piracy. However in 2011, they passed an intellectual property rights law. This law prohibited recent movies from being shown on TV or being sold on the shelves of pirated DVD stores. When this law was passed, it only was specific to ten movies though more were added.
We realize that was a fledgling law and something is better than nothing, but immediate questions arise about this law. The first question to be answered is how long will the movies stay off the shelves? Cambodia is still very heavily dominated by pirated entertainment. Will the piracy law also affect other outlets? If so, the average entertainment pirate on the street could be affected by this law and have their movies confiscated.
Needless to say, some of the laws seemed to be just window dressing. In June of 2015 however, Cambodia did enter in the Madrid International Trademark System. This system is noted as a one-stop shop for protecting intellectual property rights in 95 different countries. Superficially, that also seems to be a very positive move. Though the country seems to have another problem, pervasive corruption. For street or stall vendors, it is not hard to persuade the police to “Go away”.
Internet wise, most of the traffic is via mobile device. It is estimated that up to 50% of Cambodians were able to access the internet by using their mobile phone. Not counting mobile coverage, just over 6% of the population has internet access. That is because of massive deficiencies in the fixed line network. That said, the Cambodian government routinely blocks websites that have explicit content, or show discourse. Recently though, they have been more lenient on discourse websites or blogs.
A good VPN service will help you in two ways. First of all, it will provide a layer of encryption to your web browsing, especially when using a mobile device. Though there may not be much saturation in the way of regular internet, high numbers of residents are using their phones to browse the web. In that case, privacy becomes an even bigger concern . So if you are traveling to Cambodia, or you have relocated there, you would want to protect your sensitive data. Currently, there is no data retention policy in place for government monitoring. However, with 92% of the Cambodians having mobile coverage, there are plenty of opportunities for thieves that would love to get any information from you.
The second way a VPN will help you is by unblocking content. Say that you wanted to watch Netflix or one of the other popular streaming services while in Cambodia? Unfortunately, they do not offer any version of Netflix. You would be blocked from seeing any region without a VPN. That is because many streaming services use a technology known as geo-blocking. Geographical restrictions recognize where a user is based on their IP address. If you were to try to access any questionable websites or any of the streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, or even Pandora internet radio, you would receive a message that the service was not available in your area. As usual, you would need a paid subscription to view or listen to premium content, but you would actually be able to enjoy those services from there by using a VPN.
You may say “OK, it is worth a shot but what VPN should I choose?” There are many choices in the types of VPNs to pick, but thankfully we have some great selections for Cambodia. All of them have custom clients so you would simply choose a country to connect to, hit the button, and enjoy all the benefits we have mentioned. These suggestions all use secure protocols and encryption levels, however, using the OpenVPN protocol will always be your best decision.
If your primary goal is online privacy or content streaming, we would suggest ExpressVPN. They offer no-logs and have a kill switch feature in their client, thus adding an extra layer of protection to your browsing. For streaming things online, say from a premium streaming service like Netflix, ExpressVPN is still the way to go. They have a fast, reliable network, and you would be able to easily connect to those libraries of content and enjoy them. Of course, you would need to have a paid subscription if you plan to access any of the premium channels as well as a VPN. If you are traveling outside of Cambodia and you want to be able to see some of your favorite shows, we recommend the ExpressVPN MediaStreamer (Smart DNS) feature which members have full access to as well.
You are welcome to read over our list of the top 10 VPN services if you’d like other suggestions, but we think you will be pleased with any of the VPNs in this post. We have selected them over other leading VPN services based on privacy (log policy and encryption), availability of server locations, speed, and price. We also looked for services with a good network of VPN servers in the region. You’ll want a reliable VPN provider to help secure your online privacy, and a fast network to stream HD content in other countries if you have broadband access. The services we have shared in the post are the best VPNs for privacy and to unblock geo-restrictions for popular streaming sites. Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Instant Video, and many other popular channels would all be accessible from Cambodia.