Netflix VPN detection - actual engineer needed

Mon Jun 6 23:40:17 UTC 2016

> On Jun 6, 2016, at 9:01 AM, Laszlo Hanyecz <laszlo at heliacal.net> wrote:
> 
> 
> On 2016-06-06 15:21, Tore Anderson wrote:
>> 
>> But Netflix shouldn't have any need to ask in the first place. Their
>> customers need to log in to their own personal accounts in order to
>> access any content, when they do Netflix can discover their addresses.
>> 
>> Tore
> 
> Hey there's an idea, how about they ASK the users where they are located, instead of telling them where they are located.  Presumably a user will have a new billing address when they move to a new place.  That ought to be a lot more accurate than lookup based on a static map of number -> location.  I don't think this is too crazy of an idea.. my car insurance company asks me what zip code I keep my cars in.  Netflix could ask people what zip code they watch video from.
> 
> -Laszlo

The problem is that some users travel and they try to watch Netflix using their home account in far away lands.

Now you and I may think this should be perfectly fine and I suspect Netflix would like to agree with us, but I’m sure many content providers have their crania planted so firmly up their collective recta that they believe this is akin to piracy.

That’s why they don’t want to allow users who are actually in <prohibited_place> to claim to be in <permitted_place> by using a VPN.

The tactic being used for this measurement is silly to the point of absurd (why not use RTT measurements instead), but that’s what I suspect is driving this.

Owen