Earlier quoted context omitted.
Might be you're logged in? I often hit a block when using (proton) vpn if I'm logged out but not otherwise.
>accessing reddit anonymously
Indeed - sloppy reading on my part.
SoundCloud has banned VPN access
201–210 of 222 posts
Re: SoundCloud has banned VPN access
#202Earlier quoted context omitted.
In Illinois you could, in theory, be jailed for up to three years for violating a web site ToS. (classified as "Computer Tampering")
I don't think that would hold up in court anymore.
It's a statutory offense, so you could get lucky and the prosecutor wouldn't prosecute it, but it's there for them to use:
https://www.ilga.gov/Documents/legislation/ilcs/documents/07...
... "the owner authorizes patrons, customers, or guests to access the computer network and the person accessing the computer network is an authorized patron, customer, or guest and complies with all terms or conditions for use of the computer network that are imposed by the owner;"
Re: SoundCloud has banned VPN access
#203Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are plenty of VPN and proxy detection services, either as a service (API) or downloadable database, which are surprisingly comprehensive. Disclaimer: I’ve run one since 2017. Years on, our primary data source is literally holding dozens of subscriptions to every commercial provider we can find, and enumerating the exit node IP addresses they use. There are also other methods, like using zmap/zgrab to probe for…
> Years on, our primary data source is literally holding dozens of subscriptions to every commercial provider we can find, and enumerating the exit node IP addresses they use. Assuming your VPN identification service operates commercially, I trust that you are in full compliance with all contractual agreements and Terms of Service for the services you utilize. Many of these agreements specifically prohibit commercial…
There's a little secret that most of the business world knows but individuals do not know: You don't have to follow Terms of Service. In most cases, the maximum penalty the company can impose for a ToS violation is a termination of your account. And it's not illegal to make a new account. They can legally ban you from making a new account, and you can legally evade the ban.
Unless you're the one-in-a-million unlucky user who gets prosecuted under the CFAA's very generic "unauthorized access to a protected computer" clause, like Aaron Swartz. It seems the general consensus is this doesn't apply to breaking a website ToS, and Aaron was only in so much trouble because he broke into a network closet, as well as for copyright violation. But consult a lawyer if unsure. (That's another difference: A business will ask a lawyer if it wants to do something shady, while an individual will simply avoid doing it)
Re: SoundCloud has banned VPN access
#204Earlier quoted context omitted.
> which is a shame because I'm a real human being using the internet as intended. This is the main issue here, the web has become actively hostile to normal people in the quest to monetize every second of online activity.
"Actively hostile" is another of the common myths. See also: "corporations are evil". "Completely indifferent" and "Corporations are completely amoral" are more accurate. It's the difference between someone trying to drown you, versus someone trying to fish while you drown just off the bank. Same end, of course.
Evil is boring, evil is indifference, evil is amorality. That's why they called it "the banality of evil"
Re: SoundCloud has banned VPN access
#205Should be interesting to see how the internet blocks those of us who don't want to be fingerprinted, ID'd, or reveal our home IP addresses. YouTube already blocks embeds to login and prove I'm not a bot, funnily it doesn't work and embeds never play. Reddit will block me unless I'm signed in which I don't mind too much, but the daily beast and many others block me which is a shame because I'm a real human being using…
In the nicest way possible: who cares? So "they" know my vile pornographic proclivities, my daily commute, and probably what color my poop was this morning. Then what? I get embarassed? Snowden showed the NSA has taps upstream, so in my book: that's over. I'm fairly convinced if your company reaches a size where it could potentially be a national security threat, the government comes knocking (Facebook, Apple, Twitte…
That's one way to look at it, mine is no data goes out or in unencrypted, and for me it's simple. Adtech? "No." - let packet kiddies get my home IP address? "No."
It's as simple as that: No thanks, then I slide the slider on WireGuard and then I have an encrypted tunnel that all of my devices can communicate with each other, use a DNS through the tunnel with domains blocked and I can control what phones home and what doesn't. I'm not concerned with foreign governments, snoopy neighbors, war driving, or anything.
I can't solve all the problems but there are no what ifs on my end, *What if" -> No.
I'm not a number in some algorithm or malicious because I route my data securely, I'm a human being.
Re: SoundCloud has banned VPN access
#206VPNs is such a shady industry, I really don't blame companies for blocking them. 99% of people using a VPN do not understand they are giving all their traffic to a random company in a jurisdiction they can't verify, with privacy policies they didn't read, operated by people they've never heard of, based entirely on marketing claims and affiliate-driven "reviews".
There is pretty much zero regulatory oversight. The ownership structure of VPN companies is opaque, often owned by holding companies. For example Kape Technologies owns ExpressVPN, PIA, CyberGhost, etc.
Re: SoundCloud has banned VPN access
#207Over five years of paid SoundCloud here, I thought something was wrong with my setup. If this continues I'll have to cancel, basically. What a pain.
SoundCloud once messed up a huge song import - hundreds (as in more than 9 hundreds). There was no way to batch clean/edit, or even clear/nuke (i.e delete everything). Support refused to help. They clearly said they "won't" do it and they helpfully asked me to do it one by one because that was the way users were supposed to do it. I kept requesting that they could just delete everything and I would set up everything again because at that point my profile looked all garbage and noise. They refused and stopped responding. I found a CxO email and mailed seeking help. I never received a reply. A few days later, I just deleted that really old account. I used to use the site very regularly since the beginning. But after that, they never even came to my mind until I saw this here on HN.
Re: SoundCloud has banned VPN access
#208Earlier quoted context omitted.
They mandate you use Nordvpn? Or surf shark? I doubt that.
No obviously not. There are specialist products for this, and it's not hard to roll your own if you want. The tech is the same, though. That's the point.
> The (proposed) UK VPN ban that was recently discussed here have a definition on what exactly is a "VPN" for the purposes of the ban (basically "VPNs generally advertised to normal consumers")
It’s not taking about IPsec tunnels between networkers, or a connection back to your home. It’s talking about surfshark
Re: SoundCloud has banned VPN access
#209Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm pretty sure reddits reason for blocking VPN's is they want the AI scrapers to pay them for a data feed. They also block data center IP's
> I'm pretty sure reddits reason for blocking VPN's is they want the AI scrapers to pay them for a data feed. Signing up for Reddit through a VPN has been difficult to impossible for a long time. The amount of abuse that comes through VPN-sourced IP addresses is much higher than normal. It's common to block it on any social media site.
Mullvad can typically get through Reddit security after switching nodes for a bit.
Re: SoundCloud has banned VPN access
#210Earlier quoted context omitted.
I connect to my residential ISP in the USA via VPN all the time and have never had issues with being blocked for VPN use. Maybe they mean commercial VPN providers that run on the cloud?
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It's not so easy to setup. I mean: it's easy but it hits some real world constraints.
Example 1. I run Blockada on my Android phone, so I can block every ad even in apps and I can more or less firewall them (the outside calls). Blockada runs as a local VPN and unfortunately Android allows only one active VPN. So it's either Blockada or Wireguard. I'm with Blockada but I might occasionally want to disable it and enable Wireguard. I never did it yet because:
Example 2. WireGuard does not run everywhere. My little home ARM based server has a Linux kernel with some special driver to manage its hardware (it's pretty common on non-Raspberry ARM devices) and WireGuard does not run on it. It requires a newer kernel that I still cannot upgrade to and maybe I will never be able to. So I don't have anything to VPN to.
I might eventually put online a Raspberry, even an old model 3, as a bastion host on the home end of the VPN, but then it would be something else to care about and to power. It's not worth the mind share and the wattage so far.