Using work VPN on Princess (Regal Princess)

[TravelGirlinDallas]

I really want to book a 2024 Thanksgiving cruise on Regal Princess, but the holiday falls at the very end of the month this year. I have a few work reports I'd need to issue during that week. Not a big deal at all, as long as I can access my work VPN (Cisco) with the wifi package. Has anyone had success doing this on Princess, specifically Regal Princess?

[Rick&Jeannie]

The biggest issue with your plan to use a VPN is probably the itinerary. That plays a huge part in how reliable and the available bandwidth your overall signal will be. While you may very well be able to establish a pipe, just the existence of that pipe slows things down a bit. Negligible at home...not so much with the shared bandwidth on a ship.

[TravelGirlinDallas]

38 minutes ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

The biggest issue with your plan to use a VPN is probably the itinerary.

It would be Western Caribbean; Cozumel, Belize, Roatan.

[Rick&Jeannie]

19 minutes ago, TravelGirlinDallas said:

It would be Western Caribbean; Cozumel, Belize, Roatan.

You may be OK then...closer to the equator. Definitely better than Alaska!

[t18c97]

35 minutes ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

You may be OK then...closer to the equator. Definitely better than Alaska!

With Starling being used the clear path to the equator, where the old geostationary satellites are located, that isn't a problem anymore. 

[Emsyp]

You can't use a VPN with the Internet on Princess. Not just them, same on NCL and Virgin.

[Rick&Jeannie]

48 minutes ago, Emsyp said:

You can't use a VPN with the Internet on Princess. Not just them, same on NCL and Virgin.

There's been too many people who have reported successful use of VPN on Princess (after Starlink installation) to make this statement...

[Emsyp]

Just trying to help and going on personal experience and feedback from crew across 3 different cruise lines that you can't have a personal VPN running at the same time as the paid WiFi on a cruise!

[pilot]

2 hours ago, Emsyp said:

You can't use a VPN with the Internet on Princess. Not just them, same on NCL and Virgin.

I had no problem using a VPN on Regal in October. 

[Coral]

I have used VPNs on Princess for years. I haven't on my last few cruises due to two-factor authentication issues.

[gerig]

On 12/30/2023 at 10:15 PM, PhoenixCruiser said:

No, that was discontinued after Covid, except for Seattle. 

I agree.  I tried in the past.  Can't use VPN with Royal Caribbean either.

[tiggerrr]

I was unable to work on my work laptop due to VPN on two cruises on Discovery Princess this past year and a half.  One cruise was before starlink and one after. Also, didn’t work on Diamond this past January but it did work on Grand last September.  When I went to see if the staff could help, they were clear each time I tried that VPNs are not supported and they would not try to help. So, it may work for you but if it’s critical that you be connected, you may be running a risk.  Thankfully, we have a Citrix connection at work too, so my wife’s laptop worked for me to stay connected. 

Edited January 3 by tiggerrr

[TravelGirlinDallas]

I wonder why everyone's experience is so different? Seems like it would work or it wouldn't. 

[Rick&Jeannie]

17 minutes ago, TravelGirlinDallas said:

I wonder why everyone's experience is so different? Seems like it would work or it wouldn't. 

There are *many* different flavors of VPN, each with their own requirements. 

[effinaround]

If you really need to work you might be able to do the following:

 

Leave your work laptop at home and connected to your home internet.  Remember to disable sleep or hibernate so it doesn't go offline while you are away.  Depending on  your IT Department policy it might not work if you can't install software but get an account for something like RemotePC.  It's been a while since I installed it so it might even work just installed in the user's profile and not require admin rights to install. Take second laptop or tablet on the cruise and connect to wifi and launch RemotePC connection to your work laptop.  Connect to work with the VPN like normal.  

 

This is my plan for an upcoming cruise. If my sonicwall GVPN client is blocked I'll just connect to a desktop at my work and login using remotePC. 

 

There was a great secure remote access USB hardware solution made by a company called Route1 called Mobikey.  Not sure if they are still around or not but I used it to get around "The Great Firewall of China" when I was there many moons ago using internet cafes.   

 

I just checked and apparently they still exist https://www.route1.com/mobikey but seem to be government/Enterprise only. 

 

I guess the key is to find a solution that runs over port 80 and/or 443 - ports that need to be open on the Cruise ship internet system. Without those ports open, people aren't able to browse much. 

 

Just remember, where there is a will, there is likely a way! Good luck!

[Thrak]

21 hours ago, Emsyp said:

You can't use a VPN with the Internet on Princess. Not just them, same on NCL and Virgin.

 

Just did 63 days San Francisco / Hawaii/ Tahiti / Pago Pago / then various ports in Australia and New Zealand. I used Express VPN for many things.

[tml1230]

Just off 28 days on the  island princess..... express VPN worked satisfactorily for me though out the Med, transatlantic, and all the way to Florida. I was impressedwith starlink!

[Dudleydog73]

3 hours ago, TravelGirlinDallas said:

I wonder why everyone's experience is so different? Seems like it would work or it wouldn't. 

There are a number of things that may be going on.  Some companies, like mine, do not allow what is called split tunneling when connected to the VPN.  This sends all internet trafic through the VPN connection to your work servers / routers.  If that policy is in place, it will disconnect the connection to the ships onsite billing server that monitors the use of your wifi package and Princess will terminate the VPN connection due to the loss of that connection.

 

If you do not have to worry about that policy at your work, VPN should work just fine.

[TravelGirlinDallas]

7 minutes ago, Dudleydog73 said:

There are a number of things that may be going on.  Some companies, like mine, do not allow what is called split tunneling when connected to the VPN.  This sends all internet trafic through the VPN connection to your work servers / routers.  If that policy is in place, it will disconnect the connection to the ships onsite billing server that monitors the use of your wifi package and Princess will terminate the VPN connection due to the loss of that connection.

 

If you do not have to worry about that policy at your work, VPN should work just fine.

How could I find out about this in advance?

[Dudleydog73]

1 minute ago, TravelGirlinDallas said:

How could I find out about this in advance?

I would ask your IT department if you are allowed split tunneling once you are connected to your corporate VPN and see what they say.  Nobody here or on the ship would be able to know that answer.

[tml1230]

48 minutes ago, Dudleydog73 said:

There are a number of things that may be going on.  Some companies, like mine, do not allow what is called split tunneling when connected to the VPN.  This sends all internet trafic through the VPN connection to your work servers / routers.  If that policy is in place, it will disconnect the connection to the ships onsite billing server that monitors the use of your wifi package and Princess will terminate the VPN connection due to the loss of that connection.

 

If you do not have to worry about that policy at your work, VPN should work just fine.

Thanks very much for your post!  Makes perfect sense! ....Even at 70 years of age I completely understood your explanation as it wasn't in "geek-eze"!!

[Rick&Jeannie]

1 hour ago, Dudleydog73 said:

There are a number of things that may be going on.  Some companies, like mine, do not allow what is called split tunneling when connected to the VPN.  This sends all internet trafic through the VPN connection to your work servers / routers. 

Close...but not quite correct.  Split tunneling allows you to direct certain application traffic through the tunnel while the "normal" internet bound traffic stays outside the tunnel and is routed through the normal internet gateway.  The advantage of this is to decrease the overall amount of traffic being pushed through the tunnel, since there is *always* a bit of processing overhead with tunnel-bound packets.

 

But the fact that *some* companies do not allow split-tunneling is certainly true, for various security reasons.

[anon2k2]

I was just on the Ruby Princess last week and had no issue connecting to my work VPN. We use a WireGuard connection.

[JustAPrincess]

Have regularly used work-issued computer with VPN without issue.

[Dudleydog73]

25 minutes ago, Rick&Jeannie said:

Close...but not quite correct.  Split tunneling allows you to direct certain application traffic through the tunnel while the "normal" internet bound traffic stays outside the tunnel and is routed through the normal internet gateway.  

 

But the fact that *some* companies do not allow split-tunneling is certainly true, for various security reasons.

...  Which is what I was describing for MY company who sends ALL traffic when the VPN is connected to their routers, hence no split tunneling.  I certainly know what split tunneling does, and am trying to keep it easy to understand for the concept.  All good.  move along.