Comment by nly
6 hours ago
I've been using a VPN in the UK on my laptop and phone exclusively for 20 years, and the state has been working with ISPs to make "connection records" for most of that time.
On mobile a VPN isn't always effective in avoid geoblocks. Some apps are able to determine I'm in the UK and still ask for ID - reddit is one for example, if you stumble on to an adult subreddit. Using the web interface avoids this.
The UK has also moved to force ISPs to block certain bittorrent search engines.
The UK is not shy when it comes to invading your privacy or censoring the Internet.
>The UK is not shy when it comes to invading your privacy or censoring the Internet.
Definitely doesn't shy away from doing it! But one thing I find most irritating is that it seems reluctant to say it proud and loud.
Look at the situation with 4chan and Kiwifarms. They are basically asking to be blocked from the UK and they refuse to. I can't really say why the onus is put on the websites to enact blocks, but my suspicion is the government doesn't like the idea of displaying an official page stating that you are not allowed to see something because the government doesn't want you to.
>the government doesn't like the idea of displaying an official page stating that you are not allowed to see something
They don't even have to do that, the connection can just be left to time out on the client side. This is what they did (and some ISPs still do) for the Internet Archive...
Yes, archive.org is classed as an adult site in the UK.
The UK is a funny place. 4chan is accessible but IPTorrents is blocked.
Browsing with a VPN is a frustrating experience. They are abused by many of their users which leads to circular capture checks and straight blocks.
On the mobile apps can check your SIMs country code. This is how bluesky knows the UK users (they used to use IP, not anymore)
In retrospect native apps were a terrible idea. I try to use web apps as much as possible.
Mobile browsing should be considered high risk for most users except for the most mundane activities.
> On mobile a VPN isn't always effective in avoid geoblocks.
It seems like your VPN setup has a leak, or the real location is obtained otherwise through the operating system (locale setting or GPS).
I would be surprised if your locale leaked on GrapheneOS for example.
Company like this exist
https://www.geocomply.com/
> On mobile VPN isn't always effective in avoid geoblocks. Some apps are able to determine I'm in the UK and still ask for ID - reddit is one for example, if you stumble on to an adult subreddit.
I've never had this issue (using Private Internet Access on iOS).
I'm a Brit living abroad, when I visit the UK I use a Tailscale network with an exit node at my home, and yeah this always seems to work for me.
Going the other way around to try and watch British TV I used to find with a normal hosted VPN services could still figure out I wasn't in the country, but now I have a Tailscale exit node at my mum's place in the UK it always works fine.
So I suspect it all comes down to the IP source, probably a residential IP is the best possible case and with commercial VPNs it depends on how hard they work on isolating their IP blocks from known datacentres.
Apps can read sim card info. Its country and whether the card is currently in roaming, you can't full them that way
You would need to get your sim card out of your phone and use wifi or buy one of them foreign esim
For vpns I actually found that websites that block vpns for some reasons are worse at detecting commercial vpns than when you deploy your own on vps
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Also I forgot about other things. When my phone for some unknown reason had its region set as GB, I had British ads in YouTube music
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Commercial VPNs publish their exit nodes IPs online. There are services like ipinfo.io which can accurately determine if you are using a known VPN service.