Introduction

     There seems to be a division between the tech industry and the cybersecurity industry. Think about it–many companies don’t bother spreading awareness about cybersecurity or the issues that may arise from poor cybersecurity. What gives?

     Blissful ignorance. If these companies don’t look at their security problems head-on, then they don’t exist. That’s the logic many companies use, anyways. As it turns out, though, HP isn’t one of these companies. In fact, HP plans on bringing cybersecurity into the mainstream, and which cybersecurity company is helping HP with this? None other than ExpressVPN.

     If you’re not aware of what ExpressVPN is, it’s one of the more popular VPNs out there right now. ExpressVPN has partnered with HP to improve cybersecurity in the tech industry and bring awareness to cybersecurity as a whole, but how are they doing this? What’s the point? Will it even work? It’s time to answer these questions, so sit down, grab a drink, and allow me to explain the current climate.

Details Behind ExpressVPN and HP’s New Partnership

     Before we delve into the importance of this partnership, we need to explain what the partnership entails. It all starts with HP’s new Spectre laptop, the Spectre x360 13, a reiteration of last year’s Spectre 13.

     The press release for the Spectre 13 revealed that the new Spectre includes a lot of security upgrades, and among them was the partnership with ExpressVPN. The partnership allows HP to preinstall ExpressVPN on all-new Spectre 13s.

     Furthermore, ExpressVPN will be giving out free 30-day trials to any new user of the Spectre 13, allowing users to get a taste of the VPN before shelling out money for a monthly subscription.

     Now, I know this partnership doesn’t sound like much, and by itself, it’s not, but try to think about the repercussions of this partnership.

     Thought about it? Keep your imagination working while you read through the next part as we explain the point behind this partnership.

The Point Behind the Partnership

     As I said, this partnership won’t be much on its own, but I believe that this partnership will influence other tech companies to follow in HP and ExpressVPN’s footsteps, i.e. partnering with other cybersecurity companies to promote each other’s products.

     This is important because not many people are aware of the numerous tools available that can protect them from numerous cybersecurity threats. For example, not many people know what a VPN does, like how one encrypts your data by passing it through a VPN tunnel, making it nigh unreadable to anyone on the network. Data encryption is not only important when sending traffic, but also with storage. A VPN on its own does not encrypt files stored on your computer, and for that, you would need an encrypted file storage system such as the service provided by Secure Swiss Data.

     With the likes of ExpressVPN and Secure Swiss Data budding up in the market, it’s not hard to see that the cybersecurity industry is growing at a gradual rate. With the ExpressVPN-HP partnership, in particular, we see that bigger players are not entirely out of the game too. If anything, they’re making niche services mainstream by shipping them to all of their customers as a pre-installed app with absolute trust.

Will This Partnership Work?

     Short-term, we may not notice any changes in the cybersecurity and tech industry, but I think more companies will follow in the footsteps of HP. When they follow in the footsteps, more companies will endorse more cybersecurity companies, creating a boom in the cybersecurity industry.

     Maybe I’m dreaming, but cybersecurity has become a major focus in the past couple years, so I wouldn’t be surprised if this partnership was a sign of a shifting landscape in the tech industry–a shifting of ideals.

Conclusion

     The partnership between ExpressVPN and HP signifies more than a friendly promotion period between two companies–it signifies the beginning of a renewed focus on cybersecurity.

     Only time will tell if this is true, but a man can hope, and that’s what I intend to do as the tech industry shifts to a more security-oriented landscape.