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

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

#991

Post by UncleMeat »

scott_w wrote: post #20
sefrost wrote: post #12

It is only a matter of time before they attempt to regulate VPN usage. Here is an article written by a British MP hinting at that: https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/opinion/columnists/onli...

It definitely seems like she’s conflating two issues: access to pornography and child grooming. I don’t see why she thinks regulating VPNs would reduce the latter.

In the Project 2025 documents, the core things that they discuss regarding porn bans are "gender ideology" and "sexualizing children." Banning access to information with lgbt themes is not some incidental part of this but is a core goal of the effort, at least in the US.

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

#992

Post by sjw987 »

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…

It does seem to me, British people are very quick to call for "bans" on anything that they don't like. I always believed it comes from the average British person's mediocrity (and acceptance of) and crab-in-bucket mentality.

This country has so many (excuse my rudeness) lamearses, and they seem to revel in pulling everybody down to their level. Whenever they feel challenged by somebody else having genuine hobbies and interests (beyond consumption of food, drink, substances, and media), being fit and healthy, or being educated, they get threatened and start trying to pull that person down. I've seen it all my life.

However when you do find interesting and talented people here, they shine through. It's just needles and haystacks.

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

#993

Post by beefnugs »

nativeit wrote: post #889

I guess we’ll do anything to protect children…except teach them to think critically.

Speaking of teaching: time to teach everyone in the uk how to purchase cloud computing time and how to create ssh tunnels.

Good luck on that economy after you ban all https and cloud computing

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

#994

Post by Pooge »

efilife wrote: post #985
Pooge wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For rules introduced by Conservatives?

Hey, not sure if this is bad HN ethiquette (probably is) but I haven't found any other option to contact you. I posted the list you asked about in another thread about a week ago. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44637624

Awesome, thank you!!

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

#995

Post by account42 »

gorgoiler wrote: post #63

The VPN trick potentially won’t last long. We’ve seen it go stale already in the world of intellectual property rights. For at least the last ten years Netflix et al have been well aware of which AS numbers / IP netblocks correspond to people sat at home in front of the TV, and which correspond to servers in a rack somewhere (including those hosting VPN endpoints.) One tweak to the rules and all of a sudden not only…

> One tweak to the rules and all of a sudden not only do porn sites have to verify the age of their UK visitors but also anyone connecting from something other than a residential ISP.

That would be quite the overreach as those endpoints are no longer under the UK jurisdiction and there is no way for a website to tell if the user connecting through them is or is not in the UK.

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

#996

Post by account42 »

jon-wood wrote: post #427
ricardobeat wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no way to offer “residential endpoints” at scale with sufficient bandwidth for anything other than simple browsing of text websites. As shown by the very effective Netflix strategy of blocking VPN addresses, it’s been very hard to slip through for a good four or five years now.

It is absolutely possible and multiple providers already do it, just search for “residential ip vpn”. The legit ones pay people $20 a month or so to plug a mysterious box into their network which the provider will route traffic through. The shadier ones will just route your traffic straight through a botnet.

If there is enough demand then IPSs themselves could offer this service to foreign customers.

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

#997

Post by Kiruk »

b112 wrote: post #805
palmfacehn wrote: post #786

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have to disagree with the "Christian Nationalist" characterization. https://www.politics.co.uk/news/2025/07/29/nigel-farage-taki... >"Nigel Farage ‘on the side of predators’ with Online Safety Act criticism, says Labour" Is the UK's Labour Party now Christian Nationalist? The end goal here is digital ID and censorship. Compare this to the perennial efforts for encryption backdoors. If there is a characterization th…

The elephant in the room, is 'foreign actor'. All of our platforms are inundated by an overwhelming amount of well crafted, targeted (specific per person) campaigns of disinformation by foreign actors. China, Russia, Iran, and others cannot even remotely hope to stand against the West. Yet if you cannot stand against your adversary, you must weaken them. You promote infighting. You take minor issues which can be coop…

So if you don't give your ID to multiple corporations in league with foreign governments, then foreign governments win?

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

#998

Post by Eddy_Viscosity2 »

ricardobeat wrote: post #264
kelsey98765431 wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is just a cat a mouse game. VPN services will start to offer residential endpoints when enough websites start blocking them enough to damage the value proposition. There is no way on the current internet to verify an ip address means anything at all other than it's an ip address.

There is no way to offer “residential endpoints” at scale with sufficient bandwidth for anything other than simple browsing of text websites. As shown by the very effective Netflix strategy of blocking VPN addresses, it’s been very hard to slip through for a good four or five years now.

Netflix blocking just wasn't a big enough of a motivator to solve that problem. But messing with people's porn access would be. The internet was built on porn distribution.

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

#999

Post by blendo »

ivanjermakov wrote: post #553
blendo wrote: post #483

I need to prove my age to buy a lottery ticket or purchase alcohol. The merchant typically doesn't save my id info. What if I could purchase a unique QR code, good for maybe a month, that I could use online to prove my age? There'd still be problems in the US with 1st amendment issues, but I'd at least remain anonymous.

> that I could use online to prove my age This is just moving personal data responsibilities from service providers (e.g. porn sites) to the central authority (QR code maker and verifier). Unless there is a semi-anonymous way of purchasing age proofs, e.g. over the counter.

Yes, that's what I'm suggesting: over the counter. Like booze or a lottery ticket.

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

#1000

Post by immibis »

tim333 wrote: post #685
Profan wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I uh, surely you knew about visas before this?

I think people assumed there would be an ongoing deal on free travel. Personally I thought there might be. Still no there wasn't and I'm German now.

One of the main reasons for Brexit was to block migrants, turns out that works both ways, who would have thought
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