Netflix VPN detection - actual engineer needed

Laszlo Hanyecz laszlo at heliacal.net
Fri Jun 3 21:07:15 UTC 2016


On 2016-06-03 19:37, Matthew Huff wrote:
> I would imagine it was done on purpose. The purpose of the Netflix VPN detection was to block users from outside of different regions due to content providers requests. Since HE provides free ipv6 tunnels, it's an easy way to get around the blockage, hence the restriction.
>
>

I know this isn't news to anyone on the list but I want to point out 
that the root of this problem is in trying to attach an Earth location 
to a network packet.  The only good solution we have for this is to ASK 
the user where they are located.  Netflix has a broken system that is 
causing a lot of collateral damage because the whole thing is based on 
the premise that they can determine where the users are by guessing.  If 
you just got your netblock it's probably going to be banned because it's 
not in their GeoIP database.  Maybe if you jump through all the right 
hoops, in a few months time they will update the database.

Working around it just sends the message that this is an acceptable 
practice and you will own the problems they caused.  This a widespread 
problem and not specific to Netflix.

There's also another angle to this in that old IP addresses (that work 
with Netflix/youtube/whatever) become more valuable and newly registered 
netblocks (like the ones everyone should be getting for IPv6) are not 
useful.  This might be a good way to keep new ISPs out too, unless they 
can pay for a well aged IPv4 block so their subscribers can access 
Netflix and friends.

-Laszlo




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