▲  4 Ways You Can Have Access To Geo-restricted Content
4 Ways You Can Have Access To Geo-restricted Content
At some point in your life, you might have wished to visit a certain website but could not get access and got an error. An error message that says that you are not allowed to access the website you are trying to access.
The error might have added to the piles of stress and frustrations, but you are not alone. According to Streamingrant stats, a considerable number of internet users are facing the same issue for multiple websites. Luckily there are workarounds that we are going to explore in this article.
What is Geo-Restriction After All?
In simple words, geo-restriction is the restriction to certain websites based on the visitor’s geographic location. It is entirely possible that some websites can be accessed in some countries but cannot in others.
How Is It Done?
The internet service provider (ISP) or organizations responsible for managing website access can find your geographic location. It is possible with the help of an IP address. Do you know that every website has an IP address? Do you even know that behind the URLs we use, there lies an IP address?
Computers only understand one and zeros, referred to as the binary system. On the other hand, we humans are not good at remembering numbers. Imagine remembering IP addresses for ten websites. It will be a nightmare.
When we type a URL, the computer does not understand it. It actually tries to find the corresponding IP address, and that is the real culprit. Your IP address can tell the ISPs about your location, which is how they always know where you are. That is why VPNs come in handy. They effectively hide your IP address and assign you a fake one temporarily.
4 Quick Workarounds to Bypass Geo-restriction
- Use A VPN
When using a VPN, you do not access the website directly. Instead, the VPN gives you a safe hidden passage from where you pass. The VPN service will hide your IP address by encrypting it with an encryption algorithm. The ISP will never know your IP address.
The key thing to understand is that your IP address after using a VPN is seen as similar to the IP address of the VPN server. The VPN server will be a barrier between your IP address and the ISP.
Pros
- Your IP will be hidden and encrypted.
- Good VPNs give you higher bandwidth and speed.
- VPNs are secure.
- You can choose multiple server locations.
Cons
- Free versions of VPN have less bandwidth.
- Free VPNs have limited features.
- If the encryption algorithm is poor, your data packets will become bulkier, resulting in degraded internet speed.
- Look for a Smart DNS
A Domain Name System (DNS) is responsible for converting the URL into an IP address. For instance, when you type http://www.google.com, the DNS will return an IP address for the servers of google. So, you can either access Google with the URL or by using the IP address.
A DNS server also reveals your IP address. Hence making it possible to leak out your physical location. What you need to do is use a smart DNS. Smart DNS will try to trick ISPs and websites by hiding your IP address. Your IP address will be seen as an IP address coming from an approved location.
Pros
- Smart DNS does not use any encryption. So you will not have any speed issues.
- It offers access to many blocked websites.
Cons
- The ISPs have the ability to block smart DNS by using transparent proxies.
- There is no encryption. So there is some probability that your IP address might get intercepted.
- Use The Onion Browser (TOR)
The TOR browser is a web browser just like Opera, Google Chrome, Firefox, etc. But what’s different about TOR is its encryption system which is inspired by the multiple layers on an onion.
TOR encrypts your data multiple times to provide anonymity. What is unique is that when your data packet moves from one relay to another, it is always encrypted, no matter what. You can use the TOR browser to bypass geo-restrictions.
Pros
- Your data packets travel from the TOR relay to the TOR relay. They are always encrypted until you reach the targeted website.
Cons
- Currently, there are a little more than 6000 TOR relays, which is less compared to the TOR users. This may result in slow speeds.
- Your ISP will know that you are using TOR, and TOR does not have a positive reputation in the ISP’s book.
- Use Proxy Servers
Proxy servers also give you access to geo-restricted websites. They can be considered as a subset of a VPN service. The difference is that VPN hides your IP address, encrypts your data, and does not save web history. On the contrary, proxy servers only hide your IP address. However, paid proxy servers do provide encryption facilities.
These servers retrieve the data from the targeted website using their own IP address on your behalf. There are a huge number of proxy servers available online that you can use to bypass geo-restrictions in a few seconds.
Pros
- You can bypass geo-restrictions while staying anonymous.
Cons
- As free proxy servers do not encrypt your data, there can be security issues.
- Free ones are usually slower.
Conclusion
Not being able to access the desired website can be frustrating. Changing your geographic location is also not a viable solution. Luckily, there are a few workarounds that can be adopted to bypass the restriction. Those workarounds are explained in this article, and it just takes a few seconds to apply for these and access anything across the internet. For any Further details Please Visit This Site.
