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Tell HN: Russia has started blocking OpenVPN/WireGuard connections

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Re: Tell HN: Russia has started blocking OpenVPN/WireGuard connections

#141

Post by mrshadowgoose »

jvanderbot wrote: post #60
throwbas wrote: post #15

I have the fortune to reside in Russia-controlled Donbas. Over here they have been blocking all WireGuard connections for a long time. OpenVPN seems to be blocked selectively depending on the host. The government and commerce must need it more than WireGuard. It isn't consistent. Different ISPs block different hosts and protocols at different times. I assume we are a kind of test and staging environment for censorshi…

How, technically, can they block wire guard? It can operate as pure UDP on any port. Are we referring to wireguard vendors like tailscale here?

The protocol has a defined structure (check out 5.4.6 in [1]), and can therefore be detected and blocked. It's probably easier to block than a TLS VPN, which has a lot of typical TLS noise to hide in.

[1] https://www.wireguard.com/papers/wireguard.pdf

Re: Tell HN: Russia has started blocking OpenVPN/WireGuard connections

#142

Post by michael1999 »

gruez wrote: post #108
superkuh wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shadowsocks does work against MITM attacks by my US ISP Comcast though. It is great software.

What "MITM attacks" are you talking about?

Stream-downscaling, ad injection, etc. US isp shenanigans.

Re: Tell HN: Russia has started blocking OpenVPN/WireGuard connections

#143

Post by MezzoDelCammin »

dang wrote: post #153
throwbas wrote: post #15

I have the fortune to reside in Russia-controlled Donbas. Over here they have been blocking all WireGuard connections for a long time. OpenVPN seems to be blocked selectively depending on the host. The government and commerce must need it more than WireGuard. It isn't consistent. Different ISPs block different hosts and protocols at different times. I assume we are a kind of test and staging environment for censorshi…

[stub for offtopicness]

Damn. So sorry, mate! I was born not far from a Soviet base back before the curtain fall, but nothing like Donbas.

Fingers crossed and some contributions to the cause already done. In the meantime : Slava Ukraini!

Re: Tell HN: Russia has started blocking OpenVPN/WireGuard connections

#144

Post by d0mine »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #43
8organicbits wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the current legal risk of using a VPN in China or Russia these days? I found a couple articles about people getting charged, but none I know to be reputable or particularly well written.

China at least, isn’t a strong rule of law country, rather it is more of a rule by law one. So if they want to get you, they’ll find some law to get you on, and if they don’t, they won’t go after you for using a VPN or other minor offenses. So I wouldn’t really worry about it.

Are there any other types of countries? Note: you don't need to put something into law to silence someone.

If necessary anyone can be canceled. Everybody is "guilty" but select few are prosecuted.

Therefore the real power belongs to those who decides what issues can be ignored.

Re: Tell HN: Russia has started blocking OpenVPN/WireGuard connections

#145

Post by denton-scratch »

WhatsTheBigIdea wrote: post #130
libertine wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You do realize Putin has a significantly higher approval rating among Russians than Biden, Trump, or Congress has among Americans, yes? I'm not going to waste time arguing about fantasy. If you want to have a discussion grounded in reality, I'm up for it. With that said, that statement you made you have in no way shape or form to support it - not about Biden, Trump or Congress, but about Putin. You have no idea how…

"Independent Polling" of people living under a repressive regime appears to be 100% impossible to me. Yet the idea that such a thing exists seems widespread? Can anyone here explain how independent polling under a repressive regime can be accomplished? Please educate me/us!

https://www.levada.ru/en/about-us/

They explain their methodology, and discuss things like what kind of questions tend to result in respondents terminating the interview.

I don't know how independent they really are; but I haven't seen evidence that they are effectively state-controlled.

If they are independent, then presumably it's true that most Russians are nationalists and Putinists. That doesn't seem implausible; as far as I can tell, a majority of voters in the USA are nationalists and Trumpists.

I've never visited a country while it was under the fist of a dictator. And in a way, Russia is special; in Russian history, autocracy and tyranny have been a constant, except for the ten years after the collapse of the CCCP. Those ten years were miserable for Russians, so it would be unsurprising if they feel safer and more comfortable with autocracy and tyranny.

Re: Tell HN: Russia has started blocking OpenVPN/WireGuard connections

#146

Post by wiml »

vbezhenar wrote: post #29

Working around DPI blocks is possible as long as you can get your hands on foreign VPS. Just invent your own protocol and use it for yourself. Wrap it with HTTPS or even HTTP, nobody's has resources to analyse every single website protocol. However some huge ingress/egress traffic to unknown website with few random pages looks very suspiciously. So it's possible to select those websites using statistics analysis. Now…

That's what "domain fronting" was: you put an innocuous domain in the SNI but a different domain in the Host: header and in some circumstances with some CDNs this would work.

Re: Tell HN: Russia has started blocking OpenVPN/WireGuard connections

#150

Post by feedforward »

someotherperson wrote: post #16

Unfortunately, thanks to the Great Firewall of China, there has been a lot of resources put in to fingerprint VPNs and block them by state actors. Fortunately, however, there is equally years of some of the smartest minds on the planet working to bypass Chinese censorship, so there are some great OpenVPN alternatives. I really encourage you to look into something like Shadowsocks which Chinese people have found great…

Should point out when people go into the Sturm und Drang of the Great Firewall, that it was largely built by corporate America.

https://www.wired.com/2008/05/leaked-cisco-do/

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