socks

If you're out and about using untrusted networks (your favorite WiFi hotspots, someone's unsecured WiFi as you randomly drive around looking for a connection, etc) you might not want to be doing your internet business over that connection in case someone is sniffing the network. By using a SSH server on a network that you do trust you can create a secure SSH tunnelled SOCKS proxy, set your web browser to use it and you're at least doing your business over an encrypted connection.