Prerequisites

• Command line basics
• git and ssh installed
• credit card

Setting up EC2

Go to AWS and sign up for an account. The payment options include all common credit cards.

Sign up for t2.micro on demand instance using Ubuntu 14.04 image. Pick an instance from US East Coast (N. Virginia) availability zone for the maximum speed from Europe. AWS prompts yoy to download SSH keys to access the instance. Store them safely. Below we assume you download keys named amazon and store them in your SSH folder:

mv ~/Downloads/amazon.pem ~/.ssh
chmod 400 ~/ssh/amazon.pem

By default, EC2 instances are firewalled. In your EC2 instance list, click Security Group for the instance (Security group name should be like launch-wizard-1). Go to Inboud > Edit and choose All traffic. This allows access to PPTP service and Squid proxy which will be installed on the server.

Installing PPTP using Ansible

Install Ansible. Packages available for Ubuntu, OSX Homebrew and others. Ansible is a tool installed on your local computer and it will connect the server over SSH.

Clone the Ansible playbook which automates PPTP installation on your server.:

git clone https://github.com/liangshan/drill-ansible.git

Replace hosts file in the playbook. Change the IP address to your instance IP address as shown in Amazon AWS console:

[amazon]
1.2.3.4 ansible_ssh_user=ubuntu ansible_sudo=true ansible_ssh_private_key_file=~/.ssh/amazon.pem

You need to wait until instance state says Running in AWS console. Then proceed to install and configure PPTP on the server using Ansible:

ansible-playbook -i hosts site.yml --extra-vars '{"hosts":"1.2.3.4","username":"vpn","password":"changeme"}'

Now you can connect to your VPN using the instance IP address, username vpn and password changeme.

Connecting to VPN with Android

Test your VPN on Android by going to menu Settings > Wireless & networks > More > VPN. Hit + to add new entry. Choose PPTP, enter your server IP, username and password. Choose the created entry to connect. In few seconds you should see Connected status and a key icon appears in Android status bar.

Please note that the instance IP address changes on every start and stop. You can update the VPN IP address by doing a long press on the entry in Android VPN menu.

Starting and stopping EC2 instance on demand

Download AWS Console app from Google Play Store or from App Store for your mobile. The app takes your AWS credentials and allows you to start and stop the EC2 instances  with a single click.

After starting you’ll see the new IP address of the instance in Public IP field of AWS Console app.

Other

Please note that PPTP does not work on cheap OpenVZ virtual machines due to lack of kernel support – a full virtual machine is required. The Ansible playbook is kindly provided by Liang Shan.