VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in • Hacker News Board

Re: VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in

#451

Post by dheera » Mon, Jul 28, 2025, 4:48 PM UTC

zaptheimpaler wrote: post #27

Basically every new law, piece of news or media I see coming from the UK paints a picture of a beat-down, cynical & scared society that's complacent to or in support of increasing surveillance and control by the government. Like maybe Adolescence or basically any mention of the NHS. The crimes they cite like child grooming or terrorism/hate being incited sound pretty terrible too, but I wonder why the UK specifically…

> Basically every new law, piece of news or media I see coming from the UK paints a picture of a beat-down, cynical & scared society

I feel like this is 100% true of the US as well, the only difference is there are multiple factions (the blue EAs, the blue EAccs, the red pro-Trump, the red anti-Trump, the red EAccs, ...) scared and cynical of different things.

Re: VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in

#452

Post by stouset » Mon, Jul 28, 2025, 4:49 PM UTC

zaptheimpaler wrote: post #27

Basically every new law, piece of news or media I see coming from the UK paints a picture of a beat-down, cynical & scared society that's complacent to or in support of increasing surveillance and control by the government. Like maybe Adolescence or basically any mention of the NHS. The crimes they cite like child grooming or terrorism/hate being incited sound pretty terrible too, but I wonder why the UK specifically…

The U.S. is only slightly less far down this path, but we are trying our best to catch up.

Re: VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in

#453

Post by doix » Mon, Jul 28, 2025, 4:53 PM UTC

blitzar wrote: post #434

The "VPN use surges in UK" articles are bought and paid for by the VPN industry. I don't believe it is possible to convince me that VPN's as sold and marketed are anything but a massive scam. Yes, that includes the company that you say is honest.

What do you mean by "scam"? That you pay and that they don't work at all? That they don't bypass the geo restrictions? Because they do.

Perhaps you mean that they are bad value(ripoff vs scam)? Then sure, probably they are. But you're basically paying to not get flagged by cloudfare. Back in the day, you bought a cheap server from OVH or some other lowcost provider, stuck openvpn on it (nowdays wireguard) and you were golden. But now that Cloudfare middle-mans half the internet, it doesn't really work anymore.

You pay the VPN providers for "clean"(ish) IPs so you don't get stuck behind Cloudfare captcha-loops.

Re: VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in

#454

Post by volemo » Mon, Jul 28, 2025, 4:54 PM UTC

Yeul wrote: post #397

ben_w wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO, the wheels fell off decades before I was born. The peak of the empire was around WW1, where the victory was immediately followed by Irish home rule, and Churchill(!) putting the UK military into austerity to save money, which is how it came to be that evacuating from Dunkirk involved a lot of civilian ships, amongst other things: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Year_Rule WW2 was a Pyrrhic victory. Not that Wes…

The Netherlands is politically dysfunctional and the people are egotistical assholes but at least the economy is ticking. Without money society is just doomed.

> The Netherlands is politically dysfunctional and the people are egotistical assholes

Could you elaborate? From over here the Netherlands seems almost a paradise of modern society.

Re: VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in

#455

Post by bonestamp2 » Mon, Jul 28, 2025, 4:55 PM UTC

nixgeek wrote: post #331

cs02rm0 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The UK is becoming increasingly authoritarian in ways that feel increasingly antagonistic to the majority of the population, regardless of political party. Taxes are rising (with tax take falling), crimes are going unchecked, just mentioning increased immigration gets a lot of people's backs up, but as GDP per capita continues to stall and even fall, the pressure it puts on services is a factor for many. And we're se…

Where do you see people leaving heading towards? What’s your emigration destination? It seems like most countries have their challenges and I’m curious where people who have inevitably done more research than me are landing, literally!

I was going to ask the same thing and I hope they answer.

I can't speak for OP but I can report on what I'm seeing... I know a lot of British, Canadian, and Australian expats that have moved to California in the past 5-15 years.

Why? Healthcare is probably everyone's first concern, but expats tend to be well educated successful people who can afford excellent healthcare... I'm an expat from a different country and seeing the top end of the healthcare facilities in the States is a luxury experience compared to national healthcare where I'm from. I wish everyone here had access to that, but at least poor people in California do have access to state healthcare.

Politics is a shit show, and has gotten worse recently of course, but that's true in a lot of places now and everyone I know came in before the most recent decline. I know a couple of families who have gone back to their countries, but all of them went back because they wanted to be close to family again, but none of them left because they didn't like it here.

Across everyone I know, the main appeals for coming to California seem to be weather and lower taxes than their home country. Cost of living is similar to many of the big cities in the countries I mentioned above. I'm not suggesting America is a better place, that's a different calculation for everyone, just reporting on what I'm seeing.

Re: VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in

#456

Post by JFingleton » Mon, Jul 28, 2025, 4:56 PM UTC

Xelbair wrote: post #437

zaptheimpaler wrote: post #27

Basically every new law, piece of news or media I see coming from the UK paints a picture of a beat-down, cynical & scared society that's complacent to or in support of increasing surveillance and control by the government. Like maybe Adolescence or basically any mention of the NHS. The crimes they cite like child grooming or terrorism/hate being incited sound pretty terrible too, but I wonder why the UK specifically…

From tourist point of view UK felt to me like a police state, and I'm leaning more towards the former view. Cameras everywhere, non-stop reminders that you're being watched, being tracked everywhere(including which train car you're in now), constant reminders about possible dangerous bags being left alone etc. Tracking would feel helpful and useful, if not for constant oppressive reminders that "Bad Thing could happe…

I always thought a police state would demand identification at every street corner (perhaps I'm wrong?) and any minor breaking of the law being dealt with severe justice. The UK has always been against a "state ID" unlike a lot of European countries, so I'm not completely convinced the description of "police state" is accurate. In fact I think it's the opposite given people can freely break the law despite cameras being on every street corner.

The UK is basically an end-of-days advanced state: bureaucracy taken to the extreme, with a heavy dose of nanny-state "mind the gap" messaging.

Bureaucracy kills any kind of infrastructure project (see HS2), so don't expect any improvements any time soon.

We do have some nice cities: Manchester, York, Edinburgh, Oxford, Cambridge. (I've probably missed a few from this list). London feels pretty far from 30 years ago - and not in a good way.

Re: VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in

#457

Post by flumpcakes » Mon, Jul 28, 2025, 4:56 PM UTC

Spivak wrote: post #230

xdfgh1112 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They banned porn with choking in it. They banned toy advertising in the evening. They tried to ban client side encryption for iCloud. Make no mistake they will go for vpns too.

Banning porn depicting choking "to protect women from violence" is so funny. You could not ask for a better example of moral panic from people that didn't do their research. Choking is a strongly women preferred kink.

There's also a reported epidemic of women being choked during sex unprovoked, and who certainly don't want it. Unfortunately these laws are being made from things happening in the real world that get traction.

Is the law a good way to stop this? I don't know. The main tool of governance for our elected leaders are laws, and so that's what they do.

Re: VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in

#458

Post by datadrivenangel » Mon, Jul 28, 2025, 4:57 PM UTC

mitthrowaway2 wrote: post #320

12ian34 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UK needs immigrants to increase stagnating productivity. this has been the case for decades and it's why no government has done, or will do anything serious to curb it.

How does immigration boost productivity? It's labor-saving automation and machinery investments that boost productivity. I would expect these to be driven mainly by labour scarcity. Growing the labour pool seems like it would drive exactly the opposite. As two examples, Japan has low immigration and an aging population and despite that its productivity has never been higher. By contrast Canada has had extremely high…

Increasing the input labor results in more production.

Re: VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in

#459

Post by kypro » Mon, Jul 28, 2025, 4:57 PM UTC

nsteel wrote: post #401

kypro wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> just mentioning increased immigration gets a lot of people's backs up This significantly underplays the situation here. The UK state views "anti-migrant" views as extreme: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/07/26/elite-police... In the UK attending a protest against putting illegal immigrants from Afghanistan in a hotel by your kids school is likely to have you on a watch list or arrested. This might not sou…

Are you referring to https://archive.is/HgLRj ? Your summary is poor.

No? I linked what I was referring to...

The UK government has announced a new "squad" who will check social media for anti-migrant sentiment. Even if you are not "anti-migration" (whatever that means), I think we can agree that opposing migration is still a valid opinion to hold in a democratic society.

Re: VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in

#460

Post by Theodores » Mon, Jul 28, 2025, 4:58 PM UTC

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #269

mytailorisrich wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's different. Yes, everyone complains about the state of the NHS but the "religion" is that the NHS may not be criticised itself. So it is in a bad state because it does not receive enough money, that's it, nothing else. Any suggestion that the organisation itself might be improved or, god forbid, that patients might pay is indeed usually seen as "blasphemy".

The UK spends about 18% less per capita on the NHS than the EU14 countries do on their health systems. A lot of that money has gone on stealth privatisation through inefficient outsourcing of contract staff and PFI of infrastructure. So the actual standard of care is far lower than the funding suggests. And it has been deliberately run down so a US-style system can be implemented. So yes, the organisation should be i…

I like the cut of your jib. I see the class system in much the same way but with different analogies. The middle class professionals are like the 'house n-gro' described by Malcolm X and the minimum wage workers are like the 'field n-gro' (not sure we can use that word even in academic discussions given where the UK free speech laws are going!).

There is also a lack of a respected teaching class. With the changes to universities and schools, there is no longer any respect for those with an education and able to teach.