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Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

tomshardware.com

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Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

#81

Post by bilbo0s »

shaftoe wrote: post #33
mvdwoord wrote: post #16

I am completely baffled by this wave of new laws and proposals... they feel dystopic and can seemingly only lead to brutal restrictions on the internet. What will we end up with? Only attested modems / endpoints in the home? With DPI? And a government issued smartcard to use it? It comes across as if this is what some legislators are actually after... they must have some technical advisors who can explain to them tha…

I'm confused where all of this censorship is originating from. What wave of efforts is culminating? I can't really explain this from any movement I can see.

It's the inevitable culmination of their plan.

Pretend to be anti-censorship. Get voted in. Fast track all of the censorship and surveillance through congress.

When I saw certain billionaires talking up anti-censorship and anti-surveillance a few years ago, I knew we would be screwed. (I knew the same billionaires had large positions in censorship and surveillance tech.) No one ever talks against their own book unless they're planning on screwing you.

Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

#82

Post by progval »

OccamsMirror wrote: post #40
shaftoe wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm confused where all of this censorship is originating from. What wave of efforts is culminating? I can't really explain this from any movement I can see.

It's all coming from Meta: https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/reddit-user-uncovers-beh... Big tech wants regulatory capture.

There is no evidence it is actually coming from Meta. The Reddit researcher the article cites generated their entire "analysis" in three days using Claude: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47659552

Their website also added this page since I posted that comment: https://web.archive.org/web/20260411112604/https://tboteproj... where they claim their website is under "surveillance" because it got a few thousand requests from Google Cloud et al, most of them to a single page. This shows how low their standards are.

Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

#83

Post by kstrauser »

jeroenhd wrote: post #38
kstrauser wrote: post #14

This is the stupidest idea I’ve heard recently. Way to go, Utah. My home router has a built in VPN server. When I’m out running around, my iPhone can route traffic through my house. Pray tell, o sage Utah legislature chucklefucks, how is anyone expected to tell that I’m accessing a website from a hotel in Berlin instead of my house in California? (Which is why we used it last time: I configured my travel router to us…

> how is anyone expected to tell that I’m accessing a website from a hotel in Berlin instead of my house in California Remote attestation in combination with location access as a start. DPI on TCP/UDP timinings/round trip time measurements for distant locations, combined DNS leak detection to catch bad VPNs. Use browser APIs to detect WiFi vs mobile data to let some 2G users through. IPv6 accessibility checks to catc…

No. That’s how someone with pervasive access to Internet infrastructure could tell when I’m on a VPN. It’s impossible for a given website to tell that I’m accessing it over a VPN. Not difficult: impossible. It cannot be done.

Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

#84

Post by xkcd1963 »

uncircle wrote: post #53
OccamsMirror wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's all coming from Meta: https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/reddit-user-uncovers-beh... Big tech wants regulatory capture.

I keep reading this but I don't understand how a company might want to push censorship on users. What is the economic benefit of censorship? Does Meta's bottom line increase if there is no illegal content and every user is age verified on the site? Would Meta care if you use a VPN? The ones that stand to benefit the most are the governments themselves and their surveillance network.

They realized all the data on user behaviour is useless after trying to leverage on it with LLMs and now they go after seemingly new riches

Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

#85

Post by lokar »

mrbluecoat wrote: post #44
Nifty3929 wrote: post #8

VPNs are on their way toward being banned and/or heavily regulated. I imagine what will happen is a requirement for VPN providers to "know your customer" just as banks do, and for them to be able to tie a particular traffic stream back to a specific human.

How will they ban self-hosted VPNs? https://mrbluecoat.blogspot.com/2025/08/self-hosted-vpn-opti...

The question is not how will they ban it, they just pass a law.

The question is how and when will they enforce it. When they get access to your devices for some other reason, they will see it. It will give them another easy to prosecute law to use against you.

Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

#86

Post by mannanj »

2ndorderthought wrote: post #58
mannanj wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And Meta is captured by spy agencies. Don't be tricked at any point into thinking this is just a tech thing. And, spy agencies, who captured them?

I wouldn't say captured. Zuckerberg has been cutting deals with the new administration so often people were seeing him at the Pentagon. It's a partnership

It goes way before that, it isn't recent.

Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

#87

Post by gilrain »

mvdwoord wrote: post #16

I am completely baffled by this wave of new laws and proposals... they feel dystopic and can seemingly only lead to brutal restrictions on the internet. What will we end up with? Only attested modems / endpoints in the home? With DPI? And a government issued smartcard to use it? It comes across as if this is what some legislators are actually after... they must have some technical advisors who can explain to them tha…

The country is descending into fascism. If you’ve previous endulged in the politics of “I don’t care about politics”, it’s time to stop and look around you.

Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

#88

Post by Bender »

2ndorderthought wrote: post #45
mvdwoord wrote: post #16

I am completely baffled by this wave of new laws and proposals... they feel dystopic and can seemingly only lead to brutal restrictions on the internet. What will we end up with? Only attested modems / endpoints in the home? With DPI? And a government issued smartcard to use it? It comes across as if this is what some legislators are actually after... they must have some technical advisors who can explain to them tha…

Utah hosts I think the biggest nsa data center. Honestly, I would like my ISP to block all traffic to and from Utah if this law passes. I can't think of anything I want or need that involves that state.

Unfortunately it does not work that way unless perhaps I am misunderstanding your comment. The traffic monitored by the NSA will pass through their collection points in each state and will be silently mirrored to them regardless of the routing of your ISP. Even if your specific ISP does not mirror data the traffic will very likely pass through ISP's that do.

Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

#89

Post by pyaamb »

mvdwoord wrote: post #16

I am completely baffled by this wave of new laws and proposals... they feel dystopic and can seemingly only lead to brutal restrictions on the internet. What will we end up with? Only attested modems / endpoints in the home? With DPI? And a government issued smartcard to use it? It comes across as if this is what some legislators are actually after... they must have some technical advisors who can explain to them tha…

when can we hold lawmakers personally responsible for any consequences resulting from passing bad laws?

Re: Utah to hold websites liable for users who mask their location with VPNs

#90

Post by peddling-brink »

throw848tjfj wrote: post #37
mvdwoord wrote: post #16

I am completely baffled by this wave of new laws and proposals... they feel dystopic and can seemingly only lead to brutal restrictions on the internet. What will we end up with? Only attested modems / endpoints in the home? With DPI? And a government issued smartcard to use it? It comes across as if this is what some legislators are actually after... they must have some technical advisors who can explain to them tha…

We will end with correct and desired behaviour. If you misbehave, you get internet ban, and lose your livelihood. Driving licences, passports, electricity, banking... etc already work this way. Technical details are irrelevant. You should not be able to criticise current or previous government!

What previous government? We have always been at war with Eurasia.
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