Thanks Virtual, what else would you want VPN for?
Sometimes it's a bit the reverse, it's possible that some things
won't work on VPN. Some region-locked services (or services that charge different amounts depending on the region) recognize that people are using VPN to get around the restrictions, and may refuse to work while you are using it. Many online services won't let you sign up with them while using a proxy or sometimes a VPN, but you're fine to use it on the VPN once you've signed up. So make sure you have all your subscriptions set up before traveling. (like for netflix etc) You can test your VPN before you depart, the service won't be able to tell where you are when you're using it. So it should look the same to them when you're connecting from your home as it does when you're in Brazil. Other services will region-lock you based on where the bank your billing credit card was issued from. If you use a visa card with a billing address in the USA, your services (and prices!) may be based on the USA region regardless of where you are when you're online. (I've seen several examples of where airfares were displaying different prices for the same origin/destination ticket, depending on weird factors like where you were browsing, cookies set in your browser, or even WHICH browser you were using)
But getting more back to your original question, there are quite a few uses for VPN. Some people use it to get around web page restrictions while they're at work or somewhere else that's got "childproofed web browsing" on their router. I know several people that use it when running bittorrent, to prevent their ISP from receiving DMCA notices and threatening to cancel their internet service as a result. In the past, VPNs have been a bit slow and high latency, since you're bouncing your connection off a site that's say, in Norway when you and the web page are both in the USA, but lately speed has been a big selling point with VPNs so they tend to be pretty fast, and not too noticeable even when running something like bittorrent. (I've also heard of people running bittorrent from their campus dorm via VPN because the campus router blocks P2P services, very common)
Paranoid people that want to post an anonymous complaint on their company's own website often use VPN or some other sort of proxy to provide a better guarantee of anonymity. But take care, where your VPN provider is physically located will dictate which laws they have to follow. You'll notice there aren't a lot of VPNs based in the USA, for obvious reasons. Legally speaking, the USA is becoming quite a surveillance state, in part due to the laws on the books and in part due to the snoops (NSA etc) flaunting and outright ignoring the privacy laws that do exist. So if your VPN is based where you live or where you are connecting, there's almost certainly legal authority to retrieve your records. All the "good" VPNs are based in countries with strict privacy laws, and will not keep logs, so that in the event the court does toss a subpoena at them they'll just say "okay, here's your big fat nothing!"
The UK however, has taken great strides recently in becoming the ultimate surveillance state. Not only will they rifle through your bits, but they're now legally obligating providers to keep all logs for a year, insuring they have lots of your bits readily available to dig through at their leisure:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/n...te-surveillanceClearly there won't be any VPNs based there! Several countries have already restricted or banned use of VPNs, it's only a matter of time before the number of countries that can host a VPN or you can legally
use one will be in the minority.
it's all a bit depressing. This is
not how I'd envisioned my future. Technology was supposed to make it all get better, not worse...