Mark,

While it is very popular, we do not recommend Hotspot Shield (made by the AnchorFree company). The software constantly generates banner ads and pop-up windows, and it forcibly changes your search engine to Bing. Also, many sites will still be blocked using Hotspot Shield.

Moreover, company makes money by tracking your online activities and reselling this information to third parties. They state on their privacy policy page (http://www.anchorfree.com/privacy.html):

“AnchorFree allows other companies, called third-party ad servers or ad networks, to serve advertisements within the Hotspot Shield. These third-party ad servers or ad networks use technology to send, directly to your browser, the advertisements and links that appear on the Hotspot Shield. They automatically receive the virtual IP Address assigned by AnchorFree when this happens. They may also use other technologies (such as cookies, javascript, or web beacons) to measure the effectiveness of their advertisements and to personalize their advertising content. AnchorFree’s Hotspot Shield Privacy Notice does not apply to, and we cannot control the activities of, such other advertisers or other web sites visited by Users. . . . .”

I’d suggest using the HMA, if you want a try out a reputable VPN service — they have a 30 day moneyback guarantee.