• DessalinesOP
      link
      fedilink
      113 years ago

      I had to search to find this because it just started happening a few days ago. I’m surprised more people aren’t complaining about it.

    • Thyristor
      link
      fedilink
      23 years ago

      I spent the last 5 years glued to my phone scrolling reddit all day and night. This year I have it blocked on my phone using a virtual vpn with a blacklist. I still can’t help checking it on the laptop, but it’s a start.

  • @ramberry@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    7
    edit-2
    3 years ago

    Now that I’ve moved to Lemmy, it’s like watching the fire from the other side of the river.

  • pete
    link
    fedilink
    6
    edit-2
    3 years ago

    Do systems like VPN Gate represent a practical workaround to this form of discrimination?

    Welcome to VPN Gate. (Launched on March 8, 2013.)

    • You can get through your government’s firewall to browse restricted websites. (e.g. YouTube.)
    • You can disguise your IP address to hide your identity while surfing the Internet.
    • You can protect yourself by utilizing the strong encryption while using public Wi-Fi

    Edit: adding quote from white paper, for clarity:

    To achieve such resistance, we organize many volunteers to provide a VPN relay service, with many changing IP addresses. To block VPN Gate with their firewalls, censorship author-ities must find the IP addresses of all the volunteers. To prevent this, we adopted two techniques to improve blocking resistance.

    • @blank_sl8@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      43 years ago

      It’s a similar situation to Tor. Theoretically, if there were a huge number of “volunteers”, it might work. In practice, just like with Tor, these “volunteers” probably have to deal with tons of illegal content flowing through their machine, so there likely aren’t many of them.

  • @ksynwa@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    53 years ago

    I got this when I was using rif is fun and a VPN. Problem is that I don’t use a VPN service. Rather it’s just a wireguard service running on my own VPS. So I don’t know how Reddit figured out how to rate limit that.

    They might just be blanket throttling IP addresses associated with VP servers. But that is kinda insane.

    • @pinknoise@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      63 years ago

      But that is kinda insane.

      Yes but blocking or flagging (“risk assessment”) IP-ranges of bigger hosting providers is sadly pretty common.

      • @ksynwa@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        13 years ago

        My VPS’ IP address seems very acceptable to google and cloudflare. I don’t know what problem reddit would have with it.

        Regardless I do first need to verify whether it was a temporary glitch or I an actually being rate limited.

  • [deleted]
    link
    fedilink
    33 years ago

    I haven’t noticed any throttling, I use my own VPN service though

    • @Thann@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      63 years ago

      While this is technically true, there is a common and obvious implication that they meant “all known”

  • @DBGamer@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    -13 years ago

    This isn’t news, any major platforms and even commercialized businesses will block/limits VPNs. They just not worth the risks associated with them. And as businesses there are not worth the “risks” to “capture leads from” which I agrees in a business sense.

    After all if you gotta deal with say 1,000 spammers why let that 1 “legit guy” be allowed? If the usual loads is non VPNed spammers 100 per legit non VPN user 1 for instance?

    • DessalinesOP
      link
      fedilink
      5
      edit-2
      3 years ago

      They just started it a few days ago, for all VPN users. And they’re a multimillion dollar company, they can add some captchas to keep out bots.

      • @DBGamer@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        -63 years ago

        Whens it comes to VPNs, there is just TOO MUCH risks involved with VPN users to allow openly for larger applications and businesses. Compared to “ordinary users” due to the privacy nature of VPNs.

        As I said before, if it would take 10x the amount of resources to let a legitimate user “in” compared to a “normal” user then why shall a business expel 10x the resources to let that happen for the FEW legitimate VPN users in comparison?

    • @ramberry@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      33 years ago

      Just because it is “capitalistically natural” for a company to cut off a small number of users does not mean that users should not criticize it. Nor should users have to provide the benefits of supporting minority users. Users make their requests, companies decide what to do, and users consider their future actions in response to those decisions. Users have the right to say that shitty decisions are shitty, and they have the right to give up on the service. I’ve seen a lot of people say things like yours recently, but it’s wrong to talk about such topics based solely on a company’s economic interests.

      • @DBGamer@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        23 years ago

        You still need to considers the costs of accepting said users though, even if you don’t likes it being done in such manners.

        Just think of anti-fraud measures which denying VPNs are apart of. If you are a small firm and you need to protect your business aren’t you inclined to do the same exact measures and tell your FraudLabsPro to ignore/caution against VPN orders?

        • @ramberry@lemmy.ml
          link
          fedilink
          23 years ago

          You still need to considers the costs of accepting said users though, even if you don’t likes it being done in such manners.

          Yes. It is important to think about costs. But the problem is that we are not the management team of Reddit. They are the ones who have to think about costs, and they are the ones who have the final say. I don’t think, on several grounds, that this request for an end to the depressing restrictions on VPN users is something that can be swept under the rug by cost issues. I will discuss this later.

          Just think of anti-fraud measures which denying VPNs are apart of. If you are a small firm and you need to protect your business aren’t you inclined to do the same exact measures and tell your FraudLabsPro to ignore/caution against VPN orders?

          As you know, Reddit inc. is not a small company, and as Dessalines says, they have the money. And Reddit is a huge platform. As a link aggregation service, it has a huge market share and attracts a lot of information and people. With a huge platform comes responsibility for the public good. It is not good for such a company to stay in a position of devaluing a few users.

          I understand that VPN restrictions are effective in preventing spam and attacks. However, isn’t there a better way? I don’t know. We have no way of knowing. There is an overwhelming difference in the information that companies and users can know. Maybe there is a better solution than VPN restrictions. But there is no way to know that. Neither can I, and neither can you. After all, there’s no reason for users to shy away from corporate pocketbooks. We don’t know anything about it.

          I’ve written a lot about it, but I don’t really want Reddit to do anything. I don’t use Reddit, Reddit is not open source, the site is too heavy, and … I don’t think it matters.

          My point is that there is no need for users’ complaints (requests) to be silenced by a third party that has nothing to do with the company, for the benefit of the company. It hinders fair reviews, makes companies (whatever their policies are) look like mere money collectors, and hurts the service in the long run.

          • @DBGamer@lemmy.ml
            link
            fedilink
            13 years ago

            Precisely I don’t think (as of now anyways) there a mean to “filters” VPN users effectively or otherwise general spam and such than to “cut the entire line off”.

            Take the Wasp and Hornet spray that we had to apply on our porch. It is depressing that a bee had to die? Absolutely but we had to spray or else we would be “spammed” by wasps and hornets that could damage our rental.

            Sometimes you have to take the “nuclear option” until more targeted solutions can be developed.

            • @ramberry@lemmy.ml
              link
              fedilink
              13 years ago

              Seriously? That’s not the point of my story. I’m not here to discuss “how to protect Reddit from spammers.”

              • @DBGamer@lemmy.ml
                link
                fedilink
                13 years ago

                But that is WHY they are filtering VPNs to be honest. Because as I been saying it just not worth it to keep VPN users online when the BULK of the spammers are using the same.

                Even when you go out and buy something you probably gonna be asked to turn off your VPN or your order won’t be processed/requires additional steps. I know majority of hosting providers do at least.