I don't know when the operators' blocks began to prevent us from using certain services that they considered illegal. One of the best known is that of The Pirate Bay, a torrent search engine that at least for me and now works for me from Spain, but it has not always been like this. In fact, if it works for me it is precisely because I am using a different DNS in my web browser. Here we are going to talk about several tools to avoid blockages of this type from Linux.
Avoiding some blocks is easier than others. For example, if what we want is enter a web page that our operator has blocked, it is enough to install an extension in the browser. But what if it's an application that can't connect? Kodi has many add-ons available, and you cannot add a bypass of this type in the player; You have to add it to the entire operating system.
What the operators do and why avoid the blocks they impose
In order for us to visit a web page or use a protocol, our team makes a “call” to its ISP – the operator, basically – and it returns us a number that is where we end up. When, for whatever reason, the operator does not want us to use that service, when we make the call they do not give us anything back and we cannot continue.
Among the solutions we have at least two: use a different DNS or VPN. In the first case, the theory says that we will call another provider to give us the final number, and in the second it is as if we were browsing from another country. Depending on what we need, we will use one or the other. To give a couple of examples, if we want to visit the aforementioned The Pirate Bay, a DNS that allows it is enough, while to be able to watch television from another country from abroad we have to use a supported VPN.
Tools to avoid blockages
There are many, but here we are going to talk about three, or three types:
VPN in the browser
A VPN in the browser It will allow us to visit web pages that we could not visit without them. There are free ones, although it must be made clear that these are not considered safe. I use Touch VPN when I can't access a website. It is available at least for Chrome / Chromium y Firefox.
Using these VPNs is simple: they usually have a button to activate them, and sometimes they let us choose a country from a short list that can be expanded if we pay.
VPN on OS: ProtonVPN
Another option is to use a OS-wide VPN. There are many but, of the ones I have tried, ProtonVPN is what has given me the best results. This available on Flathub, so it can be installed on any Linux distribution if support is activated. In this link There is more information and it is also available in AUR for Arch-based distros in the package protonvpn-gui
.
To use ProtonVPN before you have to register. Subsequently, the application is launched, which has a user interface, and we click to connect. As simple as that. The bad thing is that there are versions that do not allow you to choose a location and we will have to settle for the connection you make, almost always enough to avoid blockages. Currently, although this could change, the version for Linus offers us 3 free servers.
1.1.1.1 by Cloudflare
Like the VPN in the browser, you can also use a DNS like 1.1.1.1 in this. How will depend on it. In those that are based on Chromium it can be configured in the section chrome://settings/security
, and in Firefox from the “Enable DNS over HTTPS using:” section within “Privacy & Security”. There are also usually others like Google 8.8.8.8, but it is not my preference.
Also can be used on all operating systems, but the bad thing about this option is that it is not very well supported. Here There is information on how to do it in GNOME and KDE, but it doesn't work for me. Until recently you could also download Debian, Red Hat packages and derivatives, but now only provide information...which has not worked for me in any virtual machine.
What does work is the package cloudflare-warp-bin
of AUR, but following these steps:
- The package installs a service and must be activated by opening a terminal and typing this command.
sudo systemctl enable --now warp-svc.service
- Later, we will write this:
warp-cli registration new
- Finally, to start it we will write:
warp-cli connect
The service will always be active unless we write warp-cli disconnect
, and to delete the record created warp-cli registration delete
.
Something that uses the Tor network to bypass blocking
I don't like it very much because it is the slowest and the experience is not the most faithful, but it can help. Tor Browser It uses different tools to mask us, and among them it has VPNs. I don't like the browser too much either, and if this is the choice I recommend using Tor from Brave.
Conclusion
Avoiding blocks allows us to decide what use to make of the Internet, and it is something that is worth it. Everyone should do what they think is appropriate without it being imposed on them.