Private Internet Access
I have been using Private Internet Access (PIA) for over 3 years now. Recently I wrote a bash script to automate connecting my ubuntu server to PIA via OpenVPN. In the past I had to authenticate with my PIA username and password each time I wanted to connect to a VPN. So I did what any good coder would do and automated this. To get your OpenVPN file login to PIA and go to OpenVPN Configuration Generator. Select your Platform (in my case Linux), Region, and Port, then select “Generate”. This will download a .ovpn file that that I will use to demonstrate connecting with a bash script. In this example the file is named ca-aes-256-gcm-udp-dns.ovpn. Create file named connect-pia-vpn.sh and add the following content.
#!/bin/bash
/usr/bin/expect <(cat << EOF
spawn sudo openvpn --config ca-aes-256-gcm-udp-dns.ovpn
expect "Enter Auth Username:"
send "PIAUSERNAME\r"
expect "Enter Auth Password: (press TAB for no echo)"
send "PIAPASSWORD\r"
interact
EOF
)
Make sure to replace PIAUSERNAME and PIAPASSWORD with your PIA username and password. Use chmod +x connect-pia-vpn.sh to make the file executable and then run it using ./connect-pia-vpn.sh. You should now be connected to your PIA VPN!