Although it is great to have access to publicly available WiFi access points, you should take special precautions when using the internet through such hotspots. Some of the maliciously designed hotspots can be used to hack into your smartphone through the known security flaws like Heartbleed. The risks of using public WiFi also include the internet data intercepting, collecting your browser cookies, passwords used, pictures shared etc. In order to prevent such things from happening when accessing a public WiFi, you can use the AVG WiFi Assistant + Secure VPN app for Android smart phones.
As you can see, this app contains two main modules AVG WiFi Assistant and a secure VPN client. The AVG WiFi Assistant module automatically switches on the VPN in pre-configured locations. This way your smart phone will access internet directly at home or office where you know that the WiFi network is safe, but will access the internet through the secure VPN when the location changes to some other places (hotel, school, metro station etc.). It can also prevent WiFi tracking by switching off the WiFi in Android when you are not near a trusted WiFi access point.
The Secure VPN module acts like just another VPN client and enables you to manually switch on or off secure VPN connection. There are no options to set the VPN server location and it is automatically selected based on your geographical location (the fastest VPN server is selected for you). But this same secure VPN can be automatically switched on or off through the AVG WiFi Assistant module to provide you automatic protection from public WiFi places.
Conclusion: AVG WiFi Assistant + Secure VPN is a smarter secure VPN solution. It not only provides secure VPN connections to avoid any data inteception attempts by malicious public WiFi access points, but also prevents WiFi tracking by automatically switching on/off the WiFi in your phone.
You can get AVG WiFi Assistant + Secure VPN for Android from https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.avg.wifiassist.