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Video-streaming giant Netflix has said it is going to stop subscribers from using internet proxies to view content not available in their home countries.
Due to licensing agreements, Netflix content varies between countries - many users have a virtual private network (VPN) or other proxy to get round this.
The firm said it would increase efforts in the next few weeks to block the use of such proxies.
Netflix expanded streaming services to more than 130 countries last week.
But some countries have more content than others - for example, the Australian Netflix catalogue has only about 10% of the content available to its US subscribers.
David Fullagar, vice president of content delivery architecture, said in a blog post on Thursday that the US firm was in the process of licensing content around the world.
But he said it had a long way to go before it could offer viewers the same films and shows everywhere.
Oh well, back to BitTorrent.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 16 2016, @06:42PM
According to the Techdirt coverage [techdirt.com], first the Netflix exec said that playing whack-a-mole with VPN IPs is mostly ineffective:
"We do apply industry standard technologies to limit the use of proxies,” (Netflix chief product officer Neil) Hunt says. “Since the goal of the proxy guys is to hide the source it’s not obvious how to make that work well. It’s likely to always be a cat-and-mouse game. [We] continue to rely on blacklists of VPN exit points maintained by companies that make it their job. Once [VPN providers] are on the blacklist, it’s trivial for them to move to a new IP address and evade."
Since that is something the "rights-holders" refuse to acknowledge and it could hurt their licensing agreements, Netflix posted a "but we're sure it'll work this time!" post:
Some members use proxies or “unblockers” to access titles available outside their territory. To address this, we employ the same or similar measures other firms do. This technology continues to evolve and we are evolving with it. That means in coming weeks, those using proxies and unblockers will only be able to access the service in the country where they currently are. We are confident this change won’t impact members not using proxies.
Techdirt comments:
Now most of the media read this statement to mean Netflix is implementing some severe new assault on VPNs, but if you read the statement carefully all Netflix is saying is it's going to continue using the same tools they've always used. The same tools one of their key executives just got done publicly admitting don't actually work. It's simply not possible to really ban VPN use, but Netflix wants to make partners in its 190 service countries feel comfortable while it slowly but surely works toward eliminating geo-restrictive licensing entirely.