Netflix's Doomed Battle Against VPNs Begins (venturebeat.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Australian unblocking service uFlix recently announced that Netflix has begun implementing its plans to block users who take advantage of web proxies and VPNs to get around location restrictions on content. Shortly afterward, the service rolled out a fix to restore service, despite Netflix's efforts. The article makes the case that Netflix is probably just fine with this: "Netflix, ultimately, is caught between a rock and a hard place. The company has gone on record many times criticizing the way content licensing deals are negotiated globally. Of course, Netflix would love to be able offer a consistent library of content around the world. But it also has to stay on-side with those who hold the rights to the content, otherwise they may threaten to pull shows and movies altogether. The result is that Netflix is going through the motions of blocking VPNs, even though it understand perfectly well that these measures are doomed to fail."

Comments

You can't fix stupid

[U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M]

And by stupid I mean the licensing deals. We're in 2016 and there's still idiots out there who can't understand that people can't subscribe to 10+ services to watch everything they want.

That's why I'm staying with Netflix. Either they get the deals and also my money, or nobody gets it. This is entertainment, we can live without it.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

The current crop of media tycoons are too old to figure that out. They are stuck in a prior generation's way of managing content, and they are doing everything they can to keep the rest of the world trapped in it too, to their own detriment.

Eventually they will die off and be replaced by a new crop of tycoons who, though just as evil, have a better understanding of how data moves and breathes, and so they will get on board with a more reasonable (and ultimately more profitable) plan. Of course...by the time they get that worked out, THAT paradigm will be technologically outdated, so people will be having this exact same conversation.

Policy always lags a decade or two behind tech.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Lumpy]

It's not idiots, It's scumbags that are the scourge of society.

Call them what they are, It's malice and greed, pure and simple.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't that different in my mind than Apple's preventing copying music directly off an iPod or their original iTunes protected music files. There were very simple workarounds (for the iPod you could access a hidden subfolder and copy off the files which were all renamed to a random string but otherwise contained the needed attributes to load correctly in iTunes on the destination computer, for the iTunes store protected tracks all you had to do was burn them to an audio CD and re-import them... although you'd have to manually re-enter the track info.)

It was useful to demonstrate to the content providers that basic steps had been taken to protect their interest but these weren't serious impediments to anyone who wanted to circumvent them.

Of course, in this era, in some places it's likely some kind of illegal computer hacking to access content outside it's licensed market if you do it via VPN.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[darkain]

The problem isn't "policy" though. Dealing directly with content publishers, the problem more often then not has to deal with regional laws. This is the same reason why games are region locked with slightly varying content between regions. It comes down to censorship laws as well as copyright and trademark laws in particular regions. This is why names of games or shows or movies are often times different between each region, or certain scenes which may either up the rating of the content for that region or be outright banned in that region are removed. No amount of corporate policy change will fix this, only updating regional laws to have more of a global standard can address this issue.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[JaredOfEuropa]

Thankfully the Pirate Bay has none of those issues.

I rather liked the policy long held by Dutch legislators: "We don't like piracy, but until there's a reasonable legal alternative, we're not going to do anything about it". This held for a good while for downloadable music and still held for movies when this policy sadly was abandonded. And it seems that at least a few politicians are getting increasingly pissed off about DRM, regional licensing and region codes. I'd like to see the old policy revived and applied per work: if certain content is available in other countries but not here (at similar prices), it's ok to pirate it. Sadly international agreements probably preclude such a policy, and if TTIP is implemented, publishers could sue the Dutch government for this in secret court.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[invid]

I'm afraid of what the new crop of tycoons will do to manage content. I'm imagining the following nightmare scenario:

Mr. McMoneypants: I know there are people out there watching my intellectual property for free and it frosts my balls!

Prof. Techflunky: You know, if we monitored everything everyone watched then we could send them a small bill every-time they enjoyed your IP. We could make the fee small enough for them to afford it, but have a huge penalty if they refused.

Mr. McMoneypants: Is that even possible?

Prof. Techflunky: It's all just engineering. The first step is to eliminate anonymity from the internet. Since this will lessen hacking and terrorism I'm sure we can get the necessary government backing.

Mr. McMoneypants: Holy Christmas! As it just so happens I own a few politicians! Here's a billions dollars! Put together a team!

Prof. Techflunky: As you wish master.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Sir_Eptishous]

And by stupid I mean the licensing deals. We're in 2016 and there's still idiots out there who can't understand that people can't subscribe to 10+ services to watch everything they want.

That's why I'm staying with Netflix. Either they get the deals and also my money, or nobody gets it. This is entertainment, we can live without it.

Boy you've got that right.
It really is interesting when this topic comes up with people I know. Most people out there DO subscribe to multiple services so they can watch whatever/whenever. I don't, and never will. I also just go with NF.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

People *CAN* (and in this age of microtransactions, it's not even difficult), and some prefer to pay for 10 very focused subscriptions rather than pay for a bundle that includes things that they don't want (or even find offensive).

If you really feel good about bundling and bad about unbundling, then why is your loyalty to Netflix and not the cable company?

Re:You can't fix stupid

[fustakrakich]

Psychopaths, and scourge or not, society rewards them very highly.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

"The current crop of media tycoons are too old to figure that out."

There are a lot of smart people out there and flexible despite their age. The reason why the move is so slow is because the old system can still be milked some more.
They're not fighting a losing battle, merely stalling to get even more money. When the well is dry, they'll go online and unlike Netflix and others, with a full portfolio of media everyone wants to watch. They hold the content, they make the rules. We're ... just spectators.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[kamapuaa]

It's not like "have more content" is some revolutionary business model that requires young people to understand. It's just not licensed cheaply enough to really make sense. And no reason to license it at super-cheap prices, when there's other streaming services willing to pay.

Really what has to change is consumer attitudes. It's not going to happen for $10/month, and many subscribers wouldn't pay $60/month due to cost expectations/competition.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, over time the Internet will become less of a playground for elites and more a forum for shopping and mass media. Preventing this is impossible...economic forces are going to force the issue. As anonymity and freedom are diminished, so will the value of the Internet be diminished, and so its use will fall into just a few categories.

But that simply isn't a big deal. It seems like a big deal to those who build a lot of their lives around the Internet as it is today. But if you just set the current state down for a moment and reflect on technological trends, you will see that something much more important is just ahead.

Artificial Intelligence is replacing knowledge workers. It is happening today. This is the final frontier of labor automation, and it is already well underway. There is no stopping it. The consequences are clear: we will have robot slaves doing nearly everything that we pay people to do today. Count on it.

The social upheaval will be huge, and probably painful. It will create a world unlike any humanity has ever seen (except in the imaginations of science fiction writers). What will we do with all that now-valueless human capital? How will we deal with the fact that we have a productive capacity that exceeds the entire planet's population several times over, and a near-complete oversupply of depreciated human labor? Will we have a violent class war that winds up pushing us back into an early technological era (unlikely, IMO)? Will we have a bogus international war to just wipe out the teeming masses of now-useless poor people? (slightly more likely)? Will we just throw everybody in jail and wait for them to die of old age (very likely)? Will we create a technologically-empowered human utopia and share it with everyone (not a chance)?

That's the endgame for us. The Internet is just a road to get us there.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Artificial Intelligence is replacing knowledge workers. It is happening today. This is the final frontier of labor automation, and it is already well underway. There is no stopping it. The consequences are clear: we will have robot slaves doing nearly everything that we pay people to do today. Count on it.

The social upheaval will be huge, and probably painful. It will create a world unlike any humanity has ever seen (except in the imaginations of science fiction writers). What will we do with all that now-valueless human capital? How will we deal with the fact that we have a productive capacity that exceeds the entire planet's population several times over, and a near-complete oversupply of depreciated human labor? Will we have a violent class war that winds up pushing us back into an early technological era (unlikely, IMO)? Will we have a bogus international war to just wipe out the teeming masses of now-useless poor people? (slightly more likely)? Will we just throw everybody in jail and wait for them to die of old age (very likely)? Will we create a technologically-empowered human utopia and share it with everyone (not a chance)?

That's the endgame for us. The Internet is just a road to get us there.

Soma + feelies, then an early death.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Mr. McMoneypants: I know there are people out there watching my intellectual property for free and it frosts my balls!

Made me spit on the keyboard.

Well done,sir or madam or something in between.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Darinbob]

I think the CBS service is hilarious. Watching Big Bang Theory on the computer and it says "Watch 4 episodes for free, or subscribe to All Access and get 7 episodes for free!" Woo, three extra episodes! I laugh imagining that there's some executive over at CBS who honestly thinks that is a good deal.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[SeaFox]

And by stupid I mean the licensing deals. We're in 2016 and there's still idiots out there who can't understand that people can't subscribe to 10+ services to watch everything they want.

No. They could subscribe to 10+ services to get everything they want, it's just very few people would do that because of the hassle of dealing with 10+ companies and the price for doing so.

Consider the Roku and its customized "channels". There's no reason someone one couldn't have 10+ non-free channels on their device. If they want to search for a specific item and aren't sure where it is, like other streaming devices, the Roku will tell you which service has it of the ones you have.

The real problem is every service wanting you to pay $8/mo or more for just their content and wanting to bill you directly. After about three services you're paying way to much for entertainment. If you only had to pay $2-3 dollars a month and could have all the billing details handled by Roku (or your Apple ID, or Amazon) people who be more willing to subscribe to multiple services to get what they want.

Oooooo, a customized bundle $2-$3/mo services chosen by the consumer, but billed together and all accessed from a single device -- I'm suddenly describing a la carte cable.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Darinbob]

There is a reasonable alternative, don't watch/listen to the content. That can actually do a lot to convince the content creators. Many of them are entirely convinced that they have a captive market who "must" get the content somehow and if they can't pirate it that they'll be forced to pay. It's not like this stuff is food which is necessary for survival. We can turn off the TV for a year and actually end up being better off for it.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Darinbob]

Because Netflix is 1/10th of the cost of cable or less? If you get 10 subscriptions then you're back to overpaying for content again. The thing is, Netflix has 95% of what most people want to watch, so the added value of each additional subscription is greatly diminished. For example, to me another $8/month for watching exactly one TV show is overpriced. If I wouldn't add crappy services like HBO or Showtime for that much money when I had satellite, why would I do the same thing after cutting the cord?

That's why I can see a value with bundling. Because if you had to pay for each episode you watched then people will start counting the pennies. Maybe they'll skip that episode, or ask a friend if it's worth the fifty cents. Any new series will be avoided because they're big unknowns. As in, "hmm, iZombie sounds vaguely interesting, let me watch that..." followed by "omygod, give me my money back now!" Whereas a flat highly affordable subscription fee that comes with a huge warehouse of choices has plenty of value.

As another example, some of the best movies I've seen are not things that I would have ever rented from Blockbuster back in the day, but only saw because they were on TV anyway for no extra cost, and some of the worst movies I ever saw were things I rented for $5. Ala-carte has some advantage but don't forget the disadvantages as well. To me, ala-carte means getting an entire channel, like BBC America, and not just one show.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[tlhIngan]

And by stupid I mean the licensing deals. We're in 2016 and there's still idiots out there who can't understand that people can't subscribe to 10+ services to watch everything they want.

Actually, they're intentionally doing it.

Because they don't want another Apple to happen.

Remember way back, over 10 years ago when Steve Jobs started eslling music online? And how iTunes grew to become THE source for music? And how Apple managed to bully the music industry? And how every attempt by the music industry to dethrone Apple failed?

Well, it took them a long time before they took the nuclear option - DRM free. To which they granted it to Amazon so Amazon could sell music for iPods, and actually compete.

And how because of this, the music industry regained control - neither Apple nor Amazon could dictate terms to them.

Well, the content industry observed, and realized that movies and TVs were in the same boat. They could give their content to one big player and let the smaller players wither away, creating a monopsony (monopoly, the other way - many sellers, one customer). Or they could try to distribute as far and wide as possible, as well as ensuring that not everyone gets all the content so there will be no big player who can dictate the terms and conditions.

Though if you really want stupid - you should ask why a show created by a provider like Amazon is not available where Amazon is available - I mean, Amazon created the show, so they have distribution rights. Why do they keep it within the US only? Everything Netflix produces is available on every Netflix site...

Re:You can't fix stupid

[JaredOfEuropa]

Most people in smaller markets will most likely continue to overpay to get their content later than anyone else. And even if enough of us stop watching and listening to hurt their pocketbook, they will just blame it on piracy anyway. Better that a government reminds them in no uncertain terms that intellectual "property" is not a natural right but an artificial privilege granted by society, and that society can revoke that privilege if it is abused.

Re: You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why I'm staying with Giganews.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[mattack2]

This is the same reason why games are region locked with slightly varying content between regions.

Do you mean consoles? I thought that the current generation (I'm counting PS4, Xbox One, Wii U) weren't _all_ region locked. I'm actually not sure if any of them are. I thought the Wii U _wasn't_, I'm less sure of the others.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Fortunately, companies like Google, Apple and Facebook, with assistance from governments in the name of "security" (actually domestic spying) are going to drive people into Darknets first. Sure, even a good darknet will be inferior to a free and open internet, but it'll be worlds better than the Orwellian Panopticon

Re: You can't fix stupid

[slazzy]

Same here, Netflix or it doesn't exist in my house.

Re: You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

It's real simple. Don't purchase content from companies that do this. If enough people did that the problem would solve itself.

Re: You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope, that's the carrot solution.

You have a carrot and a stick. When a company does something good, you reward them with a carrot. When they do something bad, you should punish them with the stick, not "punish" them by withholding the carrot.

(the carrot is your money, in case you have any doubts)

Re: You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Did it really

Re: You can't fix stupid

[buchanmilne]

"Remember way back, over 10 years ago when Steve Jobs started eslling music online? And how iTunes grew to become THE source for music? And how Apple managed to bully the music industry?"

And how did this come to pass? The music industry spent 5 years fighting MP3 downloads and trying to bankrupt their customers for 'piracy' when they could have spent the 5 years building their own online music store and dictating to music player manufacturers. They would have found thay instead of having to take their customer to court that their customers would happily give them money for the very minimal effort (no manufacturing or distribution costs etc.).

So to me it looks mostly like they are repeating their mistakes (unless you count Hulu, but Hulu doesn't seem to have plans to launch in many other countries whereas Netflix is now available in mosy of the world).

Re:You can't fix stupid

[DNS-and-BIND]

No amount of corporate policy change will fix this, only updating regional laws to have more of a global standard can address this issue.

How on earth is this a good thing? WTF? Shouldn't people be allowed to choose their own laws that they want to live under? I've never seen such a pro-tyranny sentiment before.

I've got a idea: let's update regional (Dutch) laws to have more of a global standard and address this issue. Let's bring them in harmony with the IP laws of China, Russia, Brazil, and other big countries. After all, the global standard is what's important. Right?

Re: You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why I stayed on Netflix too. Then one day I had seen everything on there that I wanted to see, so I tried a VPN service. The first one turned out to be shaky so I did not try a second one but just quit Netflix. And now I have more free time. Everyone wins! Except netflix and the studios I guess...

With the slow churn on there I'm sure by now there is now a month's worth of watching available for me. But every time I feel the urge to subscribe, I remember how absurd it felt that The Terminator was only available in Europe while at the same time Terminator 2 was only available in America. And that's all it takes to keep me away.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

It won't be long before the media tycoons are the grownup versions of the kids who grew up on napster.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[thegarbz]

That is not a reasonable alternative. Opting out of social pop culture indirectly opts you out of popular social circles as well. I always feel sorry for the random person who's unable to laugh at a table full of people who just mentioned a funny scene from some popular movie everyone has seen. It creates an awkward situation.

Piracy on the other hand is a great alternative.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

If the globalists get their way, you better hope you like their idea of society and rules, because you'll no longer have the option to move to another nation that has ideals/cultures/values that are better aligned with your own. I don't think people realize the danger this represents to their freedom.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[LVSlushdat]

Oh.. You are a gloomy one.. But I fear you're 100% correct.. Witness the claims of FEMA camps all over the country, rumors of UN troops already here.. Sure, I'm sure some of it is just scare-mongering, but if even 10% is true, we're in deep shit soon...

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

I had Prof. Techflunky for OS Design in college. I didn't like him then either.

Re: You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

These folks still think in vinyl and see the VCR as a threat to their business model. Sooner or later they will die out like all dinosaurs.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[cybernanga]

Everything Netflix produces is available on every Netflix site...

Sadly, this is untrue.

http://www.fin24.com/Tech/News...

Re:You can't fix stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't that different in my mind than Apple's preventing copying music directly off an iPod or their original iTunes protected music files.

Complain about it if you want, but there's no equivalence there to region-locking, making this a dumbass comparison.

Re:You can't fix stupid

[lsatenstein]

The current crop of media tycoons are too old to figure that out. They are stuck in a prior generation's way of managing content, and they are doing everything they can to keep the rest of the world trapped in it too, to their own detriment.

Eventually they will die off and be replaced by a new crop of tycoons who, though just as evil, have a better understanding of how data moves and breathes, and so they will get on board with a more reasonable (and ultimately more profitable) plan. Of course...by the time they get that worked out, THAT paradigm will be technologically outdated, so people will be having this exact same conversation.

Policy always lags a decade or two behind tech.

What do you do if you are the owner of "Crown Royal" whiskey, a cash cow, and you are bored, but want to get into the entertainment business? You sell that cash-cow for the right to buy into movie, DVD and video cassette distribution business. Well, "cash cow" is still pulling in prize money, and DVD and video cassette have vaporized. So you do your very best to protect your millions. Millions that are slip-sliding away.
 

Re:You can't fix stupid

[stoatwblr]

"And even if enough of us stop watching and listening to hurt their pocketbook, they will just blame it on piracy anyway"

Revenue for music (in particular) has been falling for decades. Albums overtook single sales in the early-mid 1970s and by the time CDs came along, revenues were declining at about 5% per year(*). CDs kicked that for a while as people restocked their collections but by the early 90s things were falling again (and faster than before).

(*) This is one of the reasons labels tried charging TV for airing music videos but the comprehensive kicking they took in New Zealand over this made it clear that video exposure was driving sales and you interfered with that at your peril.

Online piracy was actually associated with an INCREASE in sales, but the majors didn't like it because the sales field was more diverse, requiring them to invest more money in A&R + stock, instead of retiring product after a couple of years and relying on cash-cow megagroups for the majority of sales.

Just enough effort

[NotDrWho]

Netflix needs to make just enough effort to make the studios happy

The studios need to make just enough effort to make it a pain to circumvent, but not impossible (meaning that 99% of people won't bother).

The consumer needs to make just enough effort to see the material they want to see.

Re:Just enough effort

[phishybongwaters]

Exactly. Netflix has never considered it's PAYING customers to be pirates. And that's who this will affect, paying customers. No pirate will be affected by these changes, only paying customers. It's the same with DRM protection on software, this only affects legitimate customers, pirates get the DRM removed for them before they download the software. In fact.... I'll admit to legally purchasing software then proceeding to use cracks released for the pirated version, to remove some of the nonsense DRM. It's sad but true. The same goes for media consumption. When I drop 400$ on the x-files boxset I assume every episode on every disk will play, out of the box. This isn't the case at all, and instead I need to go out and PIRATE the episodes on back chunks of the disk. I'm using netflix canada... I know, I know, I should be using a VPN to get the us version but really, I don't care, it has plenty of the shows I want in my catalog and anything that isn't there I can stream from an untold number of pirate sites. I'd prefer to pay 9$ to netflix a month so everything is above board. Once they can provide me the full catalog I'll be able to remove adblock and just use netflix. This will never happen because of the bullshit licensing laws out there. But hey, Netflix Canada gets streaming rights to The Force Awakens before anyone else, so it's not ALL bad.

Re:Just enough effort

[Anonymous Coward]

The classic pirating vs. buying the DVD infographic.

Re:Just enough effort

[Junta]

While I agree with the sentiment, the reality is that all this nonsense does manage to make the vast majority of 'common folk' not know how to circumvent or to even find infringing content. It also makes it more straightforward to identify distributors of infringing content, sending ominous legal threats, and discouraging those that at least know where they could go. As much as we love to point to how quickly people *really* invested in not paying to get things, if you pick out a random folk on the street, they won't know how, but they would have netflix, maybe some DVDs.

It also means that I'm stuck with streaming provider X's crappy app, and having to juggle multiple applications to do the same thing, just with differently licensed content. Oh what a world it would be if I could just explore and enjoy content through Kodi with plugins without being in a DRM fight with the providers I have gone to the trouble to be properly entitled for.

Re:Just enough effort

[Anonymous Coward]

The studios need to make just enough effort to make it a pain to circumvent, but not impossible (meaning that 99% of people won't bother).

Not exactly. You only need 1 person to productize an easy way to circumvent then every joe sixpack can do it.

Re: Just enough effort

[slazzy]

I think it would be funny to make a film of someone watching a video only available in the US and stepping over the Canadian border and saying whoops, now I'm in violation, then back and forth a few times. Visualize the madness.

Not doomed

[110010001000]

It isn't doomed to fail. VPN blocking works. Sure, you can get around it, but for most people that is going to be a hassle. Just like Internet censorship, or fighting piracy. It isn't going to fail for most people.

Re:Not doomed

[U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M]

Most people use a paid VPN service. Those services will be the ones to go around the problem.

Re:Not doomed

[myowntrueself]

Most people use a paid VPN service. Those services will be the ones to go around the problem.

I imagine there'd be less risk using your own VPN service, ie renting a cheap VPS somewhere in your target country and setting up your own VPN.

Re:Not doomed

[Anonymous Coward]

I imagine there'd be no issue with that VPS provider simply expanding to offer a lower-cost option for a simple VPN endpoint. And now we've come full circle.

Re:Not doomed

[Aaden42]

This type of VPN usage isn’t risky right now. You’re thinking of downloading bad stuff over VPN and trying to prevent nastygrams from your ISP. In that case, you’ve got a copyright owner or a LEO with subpoena power who can follow the paper trail back to you with minimal effort.

This is people paying for VPN’s for paid Netflix subs to stream content that’s not normally available in their market.

Is there law breaking going on? Probably, but thus far it’s not something that content providers have made the effort to send copyright cease & desist or whatever the local equivalent of DMCA letters for this type of stuff to end users. As for the VPN providers (where the money’s going), they’re arguably doing nothing wrong. They’re just moving packets from A to B, with ‘B’ being a frequently moving target, for Reasons.

Sure there’s a paper trail, things could get messy some day, but for the time being, paying for this service on your own credit card and accessing Netflix is a very low risk activity.

The VPN services getting paid have all kind$ of incentive$ to make sure they keep working with Netflix. It’s whack-a-mole with well funded & highly motivated moles. Not likely that any blocks will suceed for very long.

I’ve little doubt some law or top-secret treaty will attempt to add legal clout to close the loophole; but for now it’s not something that’s likely to get in you trouble. Enjoy it while it lasts...

Re:Not doomed

[110010001000]

Doubtful. Netflix will target the biggest paid VPN services first.

Re:Not doomed

[wisnoskij]

And more to the point, all Netflix usage is linked to a Netflix account with credit card information and residence, and you use netflix software on your end to receive the stream and display it. Netflix does not have to expend any effort at all to region lock their content. They know where you live, they just have to stop accounts set up in Canada from accessing American content.

Re:Not doomed

[Strider-]

They know where you live, they just have to stop accounts set up in Canada from accessing American content.

Ahh, but what if I travel to the US and want to watch netflix? What content are they going to show me then?

Re:Not doomed

[wisnoskij]

Well, why would they offer you any coverage if you are travelling? It is not like they would have to make accounts cheaper if their was a clause in them that they would only work in the country of purchase. Then they can offer special travelling packages, which are extra expensive because of the extra effort required to verify your location.

Re:Not doomed

[Anonymous Coward]

unfortunately most cheap vps providers don't allow proxies (vpn or not; open to public or not) in their aup/tos...

and even if it was.. the next logical step would be for netflix to blanket ban all server/server farm providers' ip addresses...

next step after that.. compare latency within the player client (true client-to-server through the vpn or proxy) to the latency between server and the ip address the server sees (the proxy or vpn end point).. if there's too much of a difference... cut the connection, ban the associated ip block. won't stop small hops (e.g. uk to mainland eu) but it would sure put a dent in eu/aus/nz/asia trying to pass themselves off as us or na customers.

captcha: evasion

Re:Not doomed

[110010001000]

I would assume they would show you US content. I am assuming they do it by IP, not what country you setup the account in. Might be wrong.

Re:Not doomed

[dgatwood]

Is there law breaking going on? Probably ...

Depends on what you mean by law breaking. If you mean criminal law, probably not, actually. Copyright law (as upheld by the SCOTUS in Kirtsaeng, DBA BlueChristine99 v. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.) doesn't recognize any right to block the import of something that was legally manufactured for sale under license somewhere else. It might, however, qualify as breach of contract, which brings the possibility of civil liability.

Re:Not doomed

[Anonymous Coward]

You're missing the point. The licensing prevents from the content being played/watched in said country. Regardless of where the bill is sent to.

Re:Not doomed

[B1]

This would be much simpler than using a GeoIP database and trying to play whack-a-mole with VPN providers. I'd be surprised if Netflix hasn't already considered this and decided against it. Usually if a company is not using a technically obvious and simple solution, it is because there is a business reason in the way.

It's possible that content providers want the content controlled by viewing location, rather than the subscriber's billing address. Today, if you are a US subscriber and you visit Canada, Netflix will only show you its Canadian content while you're traveling. Similarly, if your DSL modem's IP address changes and the new one is incorrectly listed as being in the UK, you will see content from the UK instead of the US (ask me how I know this! :) )

If your account were tied to your billing address, it would be very easy to swap your login with friends in other countries to get around the content locks. To prevent this, Netflix would have to make your account work only in your home country, making it impossible to travel with Netflix. That becomes a customer satisfaction issue.

In any case, I don't think Netflix believes there's a foolproof way to prevent content from being viewed outside of its authorized regions, because anybody who understands the problem knows it's impossible to be perfect. However, it's reasonable to make a good faith effort to try, as this is probably required by their licensing agreements. I think that's what Netflix is trying to do here.

Re:Not doomed

[Darinbob]

The problem isn't the piracy, or the VPN, or cable vs streaming. The problem ultimately is the moronic idea of time/location based restrictions, which for some reason seems to be a major focus of the content owners. There would be a drastic cut in movie piracy if the DVD/blu-ray/whatevers were all released at the same time all over the world. No one would need VPN workarounds if Netflix were allowed by the content owners to show the same stuff in all locations.

Re:Not doomed

[jaa101]

If you mean criminal law, probably not, actually.

In Australia there seems to be no legal problem, to judge by

Film studios and TV companies should not use legislation that allows them to get piracy sites blocked in Australia to "inappropriately threaten" to block access to geoblocked services, Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) chairman Rod Sims has said.

The ACCC is an official government body but they appear to be firmly on the side of the consumer even when you feel the government isn't comfortable with their stance. For example, the ACCC seems to positively encourage consumer grey-marketing of books and DVDs/BDs (i.e., buying them from places like Amazon) as well as the use of VPNs to fight both the old and the new forms of geoblocking.

Re:Not doomed

[jaa101]

I think you're correct. Mostly, Netflix doesn't geoblock by credit card address because they don't really want to win this battle. Also, having made this decision long ago, it's hard to change policy now without seriously annoying a high percentage of customers. While it is possible for people for obtain credit cards in other countries to work around such a block it's substantially harder than just buying a VPN service. The first sign that content providers are winning will be when selected new content is restricted by credit card address.

Re: Not doomed

[Anonymous Coward]

Precisely, which is why VPN services work. It makes it look like I'm travelling. It also means the content producer gets their royalty (if that's how it works with Netflix).

Re:Not doomed

[Ramze]

The problem isn't even that -- the root problem is the entire reason for the market segmentation is to extract as much money as possible from individuals around the globe who have different disposable incomes in terms of US Dollars. The content creators/distributors would be happy to release everything globally simultaneously if it meant that they'd still get the same amount of money or more from the deal. Thing is, they won't. People in Russia, China, and other various countries in Africa an Asia aren't going to pay the same for a DVD in US Dollars as someone in the USA, parts of the EU, or Australia -- or rather some would, but not the same percentage of the population as in those countries. As long as the content is released globally simultaneously with no regional restrictions, you're essentially saying that there will only be one price -- because anyone can shop around to buy it at the lowest price if prices are set differently (except for perhaps shipping).

Price affects the number of people who buy your product or service. Generally, if you raise it, you lose customers, drop it, you gain... but maybe not enough to make up for the loss in volume. They are happy to segment the world so that those with larger disposable incomes pay more for the exact same product which they'll also sell at a lower price in another area to extract the most money from that area as well and so on.

Price discrimination is an ancient technique for extracting money from customers. Just look at your local theater - perhaps it has regular price for adults, cheaper tickets for children, and also cheaper tickets for students, veterans, and/or elderly. It's the same service, but with different pricing in an attempt to get the most money from different market segments. Global distribution without location restrictions would dissolve price discrimination -- except perhaps unless they were to release only the languages and subtitles for a region and require higher payments for wealthier regions. Say, you want the English version w/ English audio and subtitles... well, that's $50 for a Blu Ray of that. If you want the Portuguese version, that's cheaper, but there will be no English track or dubbing included so the USA will still pay $50 for theirs while Brazil likely pays less for the Portuguese version, etc.

Re:Not doomed

[Darinbob]

However note that they don't do this within a country. Netflix has same content and prices for California versus Alabama, Texas versus Alaska, even though those regions have different abilities to pay. And yet gasoline sells for different prices in different regions. DVD sales however tend to be pretty much the same price across the country, barring differences because a local store can change prices. That's because it's a pain to adjust prices regionally when you're a centralized company, and partially it's too easy to just cross a border or mail the product to a different state (legally).

It does make a little sense to do this nationally with actual goods since you generally must have a national distribution anyway, there are stricter border controls, and it's a lot harder and more expensive to transport goods across international borders. You can even morally buy the DVD in country A and mail it to country B, though it may be illegal in some countries. It makes a lot less sense with digital only items, as the internet doesn't respect borders. That's why the media industry spends so much time and effort attempting to enforce regional differences for digital items as if they were physical items. DVD regional encoding was stupid and trivially broken, essentially ineffective. So they upped the ante with bluray/hddvd, with a really ridiculous DRM system (update your players firmware every time you enter a new disc). Now with streaming it's even sillier, as they're really never going to be able to clamp down on ways to proxy your location (and even if Netflix were only $1/month in Nepal, the lag if you were to route through there would be horrible).

Then what about Canada vs US? Demographics are very similar. This is not third world prices versus first world prices, so why the angst from media companies about streaming from the wrong side of that border? If you can pick up broadcast TV from the other side of the border then why not allow streaming?

Re:Not doomed

[thegarbz]

Is there law breaking going on? Probably,

Negative. There's a breach of terms of service but ultimately you as the end user and the VPN provider are not doing anything against the law. There's no law requiring you to view licensed content from only your own country.

Re:Not doomed

[Anonymous Coward]

The ACCC is an official government body but they appear to be firmly on the side of the consumer ...

Nice! Here in the US the government is pretty much bought & paid for by corporations (just in case you hadn't heard :-) ).

Re:Not doomed

[CCarrot]

Sure there’s a paper trail, things could get messy some day, but for the time being, paying for this service on your own credit card and accessing Netflix is a very low risk activity.

Erm...who uses their personal credit card to pay for VPN services?

I thought that's what those nice, anonymous VISA and MC gift cards were made for...and yes, my name really is Tom Jones (no relation), zip code 90210 (just a coincidence, really) ;-)

Re: Not doomed

[Anonymous Coward]

Why? When one IP or a block of IP'S registered to an ISP that isnâ(TM)t last mile is sucking down tens of gigabits/sec, it will be trivial to find and block. It'll only get easier with 4k content.

If anything, it might bring on IPv6 transition faster than any previous incentive.

Re: Not doomed

[Anonymous Coward]

Really? All the cheap OpenVZ servers I've had or looked at allowed VPN. Just have to enable or request TUN enabled.

I just checked TOS, and VPN and proxy is allowed, but there was a no "IP spoofing", but I take that to be in the DoS/hacking realm than fooling Netflix.

Note to content providers:

[the_other_one]

Let me pay to have your product streamed into Canada. Otherwise I will just get the shows free by other means.

Re:Note to content providers:

[U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M]

They won't because they love their stupid licensing deals more than money.

Re: Note to content providers:

[Anonymous Coward]

What's funny is shows on CBC (kids mostly) are ONLY available on Yankee Netflix.

Re:Note to content providers:

[Anonymous Coward]

Money is one form of power, but it is not the only form. The media companies are making trade-off decisions between the direct acquisition of money vs. maintaining control over a highly-valued asset. Giving one up entirely in order to maximize the other might not result in the highest possible net gain of power.

Of course, it very well may, and they might be stupid in that they are holding on to a form of power that is simply not as strong as they believe, and giving up another in order to do so. But that incorrect power-appraisal does not negate the decision-making process in which they must balance forms of power against one another.

Re: Note to content providers:

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean like Total Drama Island?

Re: Note to content providers:

[Anonymous Coward]

...because CBC owns the Canadian rights, of course. This could all be fixed if exclusive rights didn't exist.

no it isn't

[slashmydots]

Does the credit card reside in the same country as their IP address? THE END.
In fact, take their credit card billing address and just use that for zone licensing and ignore their IP address. It's rather difficult to get a credit card with a billing address in a country you don't reside in and aren't a citizen of.

Re:no it isn't

[i.r.id10t]

In fact, take their credit card billing address and just use that for zone licensing and ignore their IP address. It's rather difficult to get a credit card with a billing address in a country you don't reside in and aren't a citizen of.

This.

Re: no it isn't

[Anonymous Coward]

Like payoneer?

Re:no it isn't

[Ambassador Kosh]

I would love this.

Steam recently started doing this and it is great. I am in Germany and I can still buy US games on my US account in US prices.

All I want from Netflix is to watch the USA version with my USA account.

Re:no it isn't

[PRMan]

Not really the end. Do you hate the military? Because their credit cards are usually in the US but they are overseas.

Re:no it isn't

[Anonymous Coward]

Get a pre-paid US credit card and you are done

Re:no it isn't

[Aaden42]

You’ve heard of pre-paid debit cards perhaps? Easy to buy a US-based one over the interwebs and send to your address wherever. Sure, you can block those providers, but you risk pissing off legit in-country customers who use them. They’re also about as plentiful and quickly created as new VPN services, so you have the same whack-a-mole problem if you try to police which credit card prefixes you block.

Also, odds are good you can find a US friend willing to pay your sub for you on their credit card. You can buy year long Netflix gift certificates and send them wherever you like. Gimme a $10 premium, and I doubt I’d think twice of buying a gift cert & emailing you the code.

Re:no it isn't

[Anonymous Coward]

So travelling abroad, I should be locked out of my Netflix account? Short-sighted "I have the solution" thinking like this is what's causing problems, not solving them.

Re:no it isn't

[saikou]

You mean any prepaid bought-in-a-pharmacy card?
Those allow any physical US address to be used as a "billing" address.
Though I suppose they could try to block prepaid cards in their billing system

Or a Netflix "gift" balance (one of those "Buy Galaxy S6 phone, get free Netflix for a year")

I presume primary way to beat VPNs are "is this a retail ISP block" and "are there more than N streaming connection request for distinct users coming from the same IP address". If both are "true" - voila, you have a VPN that is masking Netflix users.
And while VPN could theoretically get an IP address for each user, it would be quite expensive for them (for IPv6 this would also work, as you have one routable block exhibiting requests from a bunch of random users with vastly different billing addresses)

Re:no it isn't

[Midnight Thunder]

Not everyone is geographically static. People travel, that includes international travel. The challenge is blocking VPNs, while not blocking paying customers that are travelling. They are certainly doing this to appease the local distributors, but it is a fine line they need to tread. Hopefully they don't resort to the cell phone model, where you get charged extra for roaming time.

Re:no it isn't

[gmack]

When you do this you get intermediaries who subscribe for you and send you your login info. In Spain there were a few satellite people who did this +vpn.

Re:no it isn't

[myowntrueself]

You mean any prepaid bought-in-a-pharmacy card?
Those allow any physical US address to be used as a "billing" address.
Though I suppose they could try to block prepaid cards in their billing system

Or a Netflix "gift" balance (one of those "Buy Galaxy S6 phone, get free Netflix for a year")

I presume primary way to beat VPNs are "is this a retail ISP block" and "are there more than N streaming connection request for distinct users coming from the same IP address". If both are "true" - voila, you have a VPN that is masking Netflix users.
And while VPN could theoretically get an IP address for each user, it would be quite expensive for them (for IPv6 this would also work, as you have one routable block exhibiting requests from a bunch of random users with vastly different billing addresses)

They could easily get an IP per user. IPv6

The 'VPN' provider could just act as an IPv6 tunnel broker.

Re:no it isn't

[Anonymous Coward]

take their credit card billing address and just use that for zone licensing and ignore their IP address

Their physical location doesn't matter.

Re:no it isn't

[Anonymous Coward]

Does the credit card reside in the same country as their IP address? THE END.

In fact, take their credit card billing address and just use that for zone licensing and ignore their IP address. It's rather difficult to get a credit card with a billing address in a country you don't reside in and aren't a citizen of.

Interesting since I had a Hulu+ account for 3 months (found their commercials still too disruptive). It can be done and wasn't any more difficult than getting registered with a VPN.

Re:no it isn't

[mocm]

They cannot do that, because you are not allowed to watch US content when you are in Canada, even if you live in the US and are just on vacation. So they have to show you Canadian content or nothing, and guess how world travelers would love the latter.

Re:no it isn't

[agm]

It does to those that own the content. The licensing agreements are about geographical location, not where the account holds primarily lives.

Re:no it isn't

[Anonymous Coward]

A friend of mine (and family) was stationed in Korea. Here's what they did:

1.) Military family network - provided by the Army to the families - it was (I believe) a VPN through a US ISP. When using this link, they were US as far as NetFlix was concerned.
2.) Korean ISP - normal ISP in that country - this looked like a Korean IP so they could be blocked from US content streaming.

Important not though... In Korea, it wasn't illegal to pirate stuff. So, not showing on US NetFlix? No problem, switch back to Korea and just pirate it. Credit card origin wasn't even part of the equation. No laws broken in either country.

Re:no it isn't

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do you think that anything would be unfairly blocked by selecting content by the user's billing address? In fact, nothing would change when I travel to another country - I would get the same content as at home.

Re:no it isn't

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting case, because the base where they were stationed is ALSO legally part of the US, not part of Korea.

Re:no it isn't

[Midnight Thunder]

You may be right, though there may be other issues, such as where the files are stored geographically (for both lag and limitation defined by content companies) and local laws defining what content is available, based on rating and content type?

Re:no it isn't

[Anonymous Coward]

It really isn't. Even without cash credit cards that are preloaded, I have 2 CC from countries I am not living in. One from a country i have never lived in. Add the cash ones and it is easy to have even more.

Re:no it isn't

[fatwilbur]

No, then people would cancel their Netflix subscriptions when left only with their country-of-origin content. Netflix doesn't want that, and I think they're putting up a false fight.

Re:no it isn't

[thegarbz]

It's rather difficult to get a credit card with a billing address in a country you don't reside in and aren't a citizen of.

You've never tried this have you? There are whole companies who offer exactly this kind of service. I remember using it years ago to get around Google Wallet's arbitrary restrictions and use it in Australia. Naturally my billing address included the only post code anyone in Australia knows Beverly Hills, 90210. Google did exactly that kind of check and I had to get a .... fake is the wrong word .... credit card (prepaid of course) in America to link my wallet to.

Re:no it isn't

[trabby]

and pick your favourite US hotel for a billing address

Re:no it isn't

[Anonymous Coward]

Does the credit card reside in the same country as their IP address? THE END.

In fact, take their credit card billing address and just use that for zone licensing and ignore their IP address. It's rather difficult to get a credit card with a billing address in a country you don't reside in and aren't a citizen of.

That would be breaking licencing agreements. You purchase the right to sell content to people in region X, not the right to sell content to people who's billing address is in region X, and if you dare bring citizenship into the equation your about to be sued for discrimination to boot.

Netflix would love to be able offer...

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

>> Of course, Netflix would love to be able offer a consistent library of content around the world.

Attribution needed.

Most businesses would prefer to slice-and-dice their prospects so that each pays the absolute maximum that they would be willing to pay for a particular tier of service (e.g., India and US customers would have different rates since $8/mo means different things to them). Furthermore, Netflix "for India" should have different content than Netflix "fer 'Merica" (e.g., you have to be high to enjoy most Bollywood movies...unless you grew up on it...in which case Hollywood's sex-and-violence turns you off).

Re:Netflix would love to be able offer...

[Aaden42]

Nearly all of that slice-and-dice is driven by US producers. It’s not reciprocal.

Considering the US market is generally the highest paying and also the largest amount of big & copyright region restricted content, if Netflix was able to get world-wide customers to pay the US price (which it would seem they can to some degree), it’s likely they’re making more money than if they try to offer a tier more suited to local markets in India for example.

I doubt most Bollywood producers would complain for a second to have their content available world wide and get paid for it at US rates. Maybe not such a huge market (stoner set aside), so not worth it to Netflix to buy the content. But for better or worse, everyone seems to want to stream Hollywood’s blockbusters. No accounting for taste I guess.

Why are they bothering with this?

[mark-t]

If they insist on restricting content based on location, just use the friggin' geographical location of the subscriber's billing address. If the subscriber happens to be in another country than their billing address, so what? That's still where they are billed, so it shouldn't matter. As a marketable feature, this also gives subscribers access to all of the same content that they would enjoy at home while they may be visiting another country. Note further, that I say *BILLING* address, not mailing address. While getting an out of country mailing address to send stuff to for drop shipment or even for out-of-country pickup is quite common (I have one myself), that's not at all the same thing as a person's billing address.

While this won't stop people who explicitly decide to try and get a credit card with an out-of-country billing address to get around this, I do not think that such conditions should hardly be considered the norm until proven otherwise, and it might even be easier for them to police anyways, if they are so inclined.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[BarbaraHudson]

This would still violate their distribution and licensing agreements with the content producers - you can't "ship" the streaming video outside the licensed area.

And it's not hopeless. When there's enough money involved, solutions WILL be found.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[known_coward_69]

they could do this, but it will cost Netflix more money to send more content over backbone networks than locally

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[rahvin112]

Most credit cards will let you add fake addresses that if queried will report as valid. This works because you can't ask the credit card company for the billing address, you can only ask them if the billing address you were supplied is correct.

The card companies do this because they recognize that there are some merchants that won't ship to anything but the card company verified address so the credit card companies have provided a work around in the form of a "fake" address that they will verify is correct even though it's not the actual billing address. It's trivial to add these, you just have to call and ask to add an address to the account.

Though this would likely work because most people aren't aware you can do this it wouldn't be long before word spread.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[mark-t]

Most credit cards will let you add fake addresses that if queried will report as valid.

Name one that Netflix accepts.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[known_coward_69]

every major bank card in the USA does this for people who want to ship stuff to friends and family with no fraud alerts. it just puts the customer on the hook for any fraud purchases made online and shipped to that address

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[dgatwood]

This would still violate their distribution and licensing agreements with the content producers - you can't "ship" the streaming video outside the licensed area.

I would argue that this is no different from shipping a physical DVD to a customer in the U.S. who then chooses to carry it with him or her to watch while on vacation overseas, other than the need to carry a physical object around. You're shipping it to a customer in the U.S., and whether that customer chooses to then take the content outside the U.S. is the customer's decision, and shouldn't be in the hands of the IP owner. Were this anything other than a streaming service, this would be open-and-shut, and the IP owner would have no right to prevent such a temporary export. I think it is way past time for the public to demand that streaming be treated just like a physical sale or rental, with all the same consumer rights.

Customers shouldn't even need to use a VPN. The fact that they do is inexcusable. The fact that these companies are now trying to block customers who use VPNs to protect their most basic consumer rights is unconscionable.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[rahvin112]

Visa, Mastercard, American Express. I'm not sure about Discover card or Diner's Club and some of the more fringe ones.

I've done this on all three I listed. It's extremely common and trivially easy to do.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[mark-t]

The first few (I think it's 6) digits on the card will still indicate which country the issuing bank happens to be in. Getting a credit card from a bank located in another country from where you actually live tends to be rather complicated.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[rahvin112]

I'd be surprised if you could reliably pin down location by the number, as there are a large number of banks that are multi-national and operate out of dozens of countries.

The first digits indicate the issuing bank, but if the bank is multi-national that's utterly worthless as a reliable indicator of location.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[mark-t]

The first digits indicate the issuing bank, but if the bank is multi-national that's utterly worthless as a reliable indicator of location.

That assumption is incorrect. A bank may be multinational, but barring jumping through a lot of hoops to get a card from a bank outside of the nation where one lives, the card will still be issued from a bank in the user's own country and reflected in the first few digits of the card.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[BarbaraHudson]

DVDs are region-coded. Streaming services aren't. So your comparison is really off.

Next you'll be arguing that they don't have a right to region-encode DVDs, when they clearly do.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[Ash-Fox]

The first few (I think it's 6) digits on the card will still indicate which country the issuing bank happens to be in.

Back when Netflix was a US only thing, I used a pay as you go credit card to setup a Paypal account a and random US addresss. Then I would periodically send myself money from my 'real' paypal account to pay for Netflix.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[mark-t]

Pay as you go credit cards are also easily identifiable as such from the first 6 digits. Oh and the country of origin is still identifiable. Sure, you can buy a pay-as-you go credit card while in another country and use it to your hearts content from somewhere else, but then you are talking about doing something that requires doing real work.

Right now, people watch out-of-nation Netflix because it's easy to do, when something is inconvenient enough you won't stop the people that are determined to still do it, but those tend to represent a pretty small percentage of the population.

Oh, and the unrealistic expectation that either a system should be absolutely perfect or else not utilized at all is a classic false dilemma fallacy. Certainly it would probably be far more effective than trying to ban known VPN's.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[rahvin112]

Given that you are the same idiot that claimed you can't add any address you want to your account you will have to prove your statements You lied once, I'm not going to take anything you say as truth without backup. I don't believe that the first digits of a credit card number indicate country of origin. The numbers on a card are two things, they are a bank identifier and an account identifier. The bank identifier is in no way tied to any country unless that bank only exists in one country.

I could call my bank tomorrow and ask them to add a name and address in China to my account and if someone tried to use that as a valid card address the merchant system would validate it.

There is no way for a merchant that accepts credit cards to determine the location or origin of any card holder other than to submit an address received from the customer and have the bank validate it. No merchant has access to any of the personal information of a card holder unless they get it from the card holder themselves. And any card holder can add any information to their account they want including names and addresses.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, you would find that region coding is illegal in most countries as it is a restriction-in-use/restriction-in-trade.
However when a big business does it they get a pass.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[mark-t]

I think that you failed to notice the point that I had made in my very first remark, where I explicitly said that it may be easier for Netflix to police situations where people are using fake billing addresses out of country in cases where it *DOES* happen, if they are so inclined.

So to the matter at hand, I didn't lie, I really made an overbroad generalization. It may indeed be possible, as you have asserted, but it is almost certainly detectable for any card issuer I've heard of, and as such, impractical for any purposes of trying to actually hide where a person lives, or at least their country of origin, and why it should still generally be adequate for Netflix.

But you've said you don't believe it, or me... so google credit card number BIN and research it yourself. There is actually *FAR* more information that can be extracted from a credit card number than just the issuer, bank, and account number. Among the fields in the first half-dozen or so digits (depending on the issuer), a code for the specific country of origin is there as well. You've asked me for proof, and I've tried to offer the back-up on that point that I know exists, what evidence can YOU offer that suggests that the country code that is part of the BIN is *NOT* tied to specific country that the user acquired it in?

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[Ash-Fox]

Pay as you go credit cards are also easily identifiable as such from the first 6 digits. Oh and the country of origin is still identifiable. Sure, you can buy a pay-as-you go credit card while in another country and use it to your hearts content from somewhere else, but then you are talking about doing something that requires doing real work.

As PayPal verifies this, I actually had to order a pay-as-you-go card from the States despite living in Europe. I remember searching online and ordering it was relatively painless.

Right now, people watch out-of-nation Netflix because it's easy to do, when something is inconvenient enough you won't stop the people that are determined to still do it, but those tend to represent a pretty small percentage of the population.

If people find VPNs easy, what I did was is easy too honestly.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[dgatwood]

DVDs are region-coded. Streaming services aren't. So your comparison is really off.

I was thinking more along the lines of "carry a DVD and watch it on your own laptop". Region-coded DVDs will still play on your U.S. laptop even if it isn't physically in the U.S.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[mark-t]

Again, however, pay as you go cards are verifiable as such by the merchant. I have seen places that will refuse online processing of pay-as-you-go card that are not tied to any particular billing address, although this is usually done by merchants that are not immediately billing for the full amount that may be expected to be paid. While certainly entirely legitimate use exists for pay-as-you-go cards, the arguments for genuinely needing such a card to pay for absolutely everything, especially utilities, when other payment options may exist such as simple monthly invoicing, or even cheque-free billing/automatic payments are tenuous, at best.... specious at worst.

Re:Why are they bothering with this?

[Ash-Fox]

Again, however, pay as you go cards are verifiable as such by the merchant. I have seen places that will refuse online processing of pay-as-you-go card that are not tied to any particular billing address, although this is usually done by merchants that are not immediately billing for the full amount that may be expected to be paid.

Being someone that has worked on payment systems before, I never saw any merchant APIs that revealed this information on this side of the pond.

when other payment options may exist such as simple monthly invoicing, or even cheque-free billing/automatic payments are tenuous, at best.... specious at worst.

I said before, I was using Paypal. The card was just a way to get a working U.S. Paypal account.

Re: Why are they bothering with this?

[Anonymous Coward]

First 4 digits are assigned to different card providers. It's how DirecTV stopped taking Canadian credit cards. Dish network never cared.

Doomed to benefit

[penguinoid]

Looks like Netflix is doomed to get paid by people who officially shouldn't be able to pay them.

You're talking about the studios right?

[SuperKendall]

It should be noted that it the media companies who "love licensing deals more than money" as Netflix would be happy to show content everywhere if they could.

If they actually wanted to stop it

[Anonymous Coward]

They would just block you based on your account. If you have a UK Netflix account you would only be able to log into UK Netflix and no where else, proxy or no proxy.

BBC too

[ThatsNotPudding]

Let this colonial commoner pay a 'license fee' and access your far superior content in a timely fashion, FFS! Cash on the table! Pick it up and get the Torrie scum off your back!

Re:BBC too

[Anonymous Coward]

You can always watch BBC content on PBS in the US. It's great - the Brits have paid the TV tax for it, and Americans paid donations and tax dollars as well. Win win win win.

Re: BBC too

[ian_billyboy_morris]

Sadly, the beeb allowing non uk residents to pay a license fee would have the exact opposite effect on the Tories. They would scream unfairness that the beeb is directly competing in a market and use it as an excuse to close them down. The only way they would get away with it is if the BBC were virtually given away to the Murdock family, then the Bbc/sky/Fox Conglomerate could do what ever they want with the backing of the Tories.

Re: BBC too

[Anonymous Coward]

Interestingly enough, the last election may have put the final/first nail in the coffin of the big media moguls influence through their media outlets (their money will still talk but that's much harder to "work" in the UK). The campaign success was driven by a different approach to advertising and targeted "marketing" to important voters which means the screaming headlines of red top newspapers or big media are increasingly unimportant and the parties are learning it (The Tories to their benefit and the Labour party much to their peril)

would LOVE that job

[Anonymous Coward]

Boss: Implement a system to block VPN
Me: Sure boss. What are the requirements
Boss: It has to look like it works, but it is better for the business if it doesn't work. You won't be rated badly if the project doesn't work and your stock price will probably go up if your project fails.
Me: .... so basically, write docs and look busy?
Boss: sounds about right.

Netflix could easily block users if they wanted

[Anonymous Coward]

Just make users prove their location via billing and if you don't have a US verified account you don't get US only programming, if they cared, but they don't, it's just smoke and mirrors for them to claim they were duly diligent in their attempting to uphold their contractual obligations... and that works for me. They cover their ass and we all continue to laugh at content restrictions.

Netflix is fucking itself

[Anonymous Coward]

This obvious *wink wink nod nod* we wont let people bypass region restrictions *wink wink nod nod* duplicity is going to hurt them in court one day in the future, or hurt them in the wallet right now (by actually following through).

Ultimately they won't be able to have their cake and eat it too.

Re:Netflix is fucking itself

[Anonymous Coward]

I disagree.. loking at the comment below about TAX writeoff for a "business" loss.
so yes in the future I can see people getting pissed at the fac thtat netflix is trying to bleed them dry..
or something of that nature..
if netflix is so powerful why dont they jus tdictate their own terms, since they own the distribution process that many individuals need iinorder for their product to get out there and return a profit..
NetFlix is a corporate shill like many others,, They merge the NOC with the helpdesk inroder to save $ at the expense of internal service..
God forbid your laptop crashes, "we can repair the dammage, but your device wont be ready untill after we roll the new code tto the site and I take the time to clean it up, since no one else will."

Stoopid
so at the end of the day, netflix tries to go an have some fun while getting paid..
because they are unable or unwiling to secure the correct DEAL most people get bent..

so in the end,,
Netflix is the ultimate winner.. they cant loose..
But for us, we the customers (who cares, if we loose one we can attract 2 more) it's allways a loosing battle..

Instead of paying for what you should rightfully have,, you get whats left over. Scraps off the table..
I think Netflikx is BS.. Go off and bit-torrent to your hearts content..
Hit up your local starbucks or any other public Wifi, and go bonkerz with it..
Moving past that, I am not advocating any illegal activities.
mearly surfacing an alternative..

Write your representative

[Anonymous Coward]

Tell them this is ok... it's usually regional corruption for *their* fair cut in so-called content to begin with. (basically local assholes who played the system through tax breaks and shitty content).
It's nice having a larger variety for you the consumer to begin with.

Netflix needs a tax writeoff..

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix need a business writeoff..
That adventure will turn out to be a Business loss in which they will still win.
they get paid from the Govt to explore an outcome that has allready been identified as a failure..

Counterproductive

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix is what I want. Everything on netflix. If you don't provide your show on Netflix.... then I must acquire media by other means... and that's ultimately hurting the content holder because they aren't even getting paid from netflix. If you think blocking on netflix is going to make me shell out ridiculous amounts of money for a mediocre show at best, then you'd be wrong.

Something is only worth as much as someone is going to pay for it. I'd rather pay 8$/mo for all the shows in a subscription model than shell out 40$ for a season of a mediocre show.

If you won't take my contribution to Netflix, then you don't get it at all.

You're doing it wrong.

VPN is a terribly overweight solution

[edtice1559]

You end up encrypting and decrypting traffic when all you really need is a proxy server. I think I need to go into business selling the use of proxies ostensibly for the use of geolocation testing but actually for this type of purpose. As long as the proxy can rewrite the requests sufficiently, the VPN encryption doesn't really add anything but it must chew up an insane amount of CPU time somewhere. It's a testament to modern hardware that this can even be done in realtime for an HD stream. Of course I don't actually use VPN for this purpose. I watch whatever is included with Amazon Prime and that's about it.

Re:VPN is a terribly overweight solution

[duke_cheetah2003]

As long as the proxy can rewrite the requests sufficiently, the VPN encryption doesn't really add anything but it must chew up an insane amount of CPU time somewhere.

Given how easily modern CPUs can handle encrypting/decrypting VPN traffic.. it's really not a big deal. Overkill? Sure, but I personally love seeing the internet's tubes flooded with lots of encrypted traffic. The more the better. Keeps the spooks busy.

Hmmmmm

[wwalker]

I understand why Netflix is doing this. I don't understand the logic of the companies that license content to Netflix and force them to do that. Someone who's tech savvy enough to use a VPN service, and who gets cut off, what do you think they are going to do? Go buy a DVD in their local store or go torrent what they want? What's more likely? I know what I would do. So the goal of the studios, who could be getting some money from Netflix, to get zilch point bupkis dollars for their content? What's the logic here?!

Re: Hmmmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure the foreign rights holder cares a lot more than the US rights holder. They're the ones screwed.

Why not determine content by user name?

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix has the advantage of knowing in which country the user is registered (and pays the bill). Instead of (or in addition to) of selecting content based on guesstimate of location, why not just select content based on who the user is (e.g. in which country they reside and pay the bill)? While this may not fully satisfy content terms, it would go a long way to locking away people trying to cheat using VPN.

I know this won't make me popular here, but let's be fair - content producers and distributors do create the great content that we love and it's fair that they can make money and control what's done with their content. Remember, GPL has some rights reserved - this is different because it involves payment - but the point about control stands.

The common mistake here is to think that this is about technology - or that technology rules. It does not. The law does. The law recognises ownership and defines rights. Technology doesn't change what's right and wrong.

My view of the topic changed when I produced some content to sell (more out of desperate need to pay the bills than anything else). It turns out, the content was very popular but less than 1 in 1000 people paid for it (if that!), the rest happy getting a pirated copy even from most dubious sources. My stuff was everywhere - "blogs", warez sites, forums and file sharing sites/networks. On a few occasions, I asked kindly the sites hosting the content to remove it (no nasty DMCA notices) - and you should have seen the responses - and the careless disregard for months of work I've put into the project. It was a sobering experience.

Re:Why not determine content by user name?

[Anonymous Coward]

Posting AC as I have moderated. Netflix thinks I'm in the US, my address with them and on my credit card are in the US. I use a service to change what version of netflix I want all round the world depending on what content I want. As to your comment about content, just let me buy it at a reasonable cost! I can't get half the stuff I like here in Oz, or it's hideously expensive. Apple showed how to do it with music, make it easy and reasonable, and people will buy it! If it's not on netflix, I pirate it. If it's not on netflix, you don't get any money.

I use VPN from USA

[send2cbd]

I often use public wireless here in US. As such, I subscribe to a domestic VPN service. So, I get an IP address that is in SF area for my tunnel. Can Netflix tell if a VPN user is from US or international? If not, then they are denying service to valid Netflix subscribers in the US. My option would be to stop the VPN and allow my traffic to go across wireless network "not encrypted". Hopefully, I will remember to restart VPN when finished with Netflix streaming. Hey, I'm almost 70, so good luck on me remembering anything!

Re:I use VPN from USA

[zwarte piet]

By definition they can't, that's the whole point of using a vpn, but they can just forbid to use vpns in their tos.

Credit card address

[ubergeek65536]

Why the need to block VPNs? If Netflix wanted to deal with the 'problem' they would allow content based on the street address of the credit card.

Re:Credit card address

[zwarte piet]

Netflix doesn't care but the owners of the movies would like to control who sees what and when to maximize their profit and to comply with local legislation. Some countries allow no nipples to be shown, some countries no swearing or violence unless no access to minors is guaranteed, and some countries don't allow certain movies to be shown at all because they promote undesirable ideas.

It's you stupid

[Stonefish]

Consumers are being had, a large single entity controlling distribution is not a good thing for you. If you look at how Dell buys components it shares its component sourcing among a variety of manufacturer, it buys more cheap ones than expensive ones however it ensures that competition remains.
From a technical perspective Netflix can limit content based upon your location. No if or buts. Netflix don't limit your content for a couple of reasons.
1 It makes their service more attractive.
2 Technically it may require changes to their infrastructure and software stack. (but its not difficult)
3 They are well aware of the first mover advantage.
4 You subscibe and authenticate.
5 Your money come from a country
Netflix know that in the future they will limit by geographical location and the reason for this is simple, licensing and profit, but first any hint of competition should be eradicated.

Agreed this is a doomed proposition for Netflix

[Anonymous Coward]

My buddy uses a VPN to play out of region pirated Steam keys on his alt account then send himself the card unlocks. If he can use a VPN to get around STEAM of all things, users will easily circumvent Netflix. Especially since movies are more popular than games and their viewers more determined/willing to risk it.

Fuck regions.

[Anonymous Coward]

Regions need to DIE already.
They offer no advantages besides ripping off staff and consumers.

The ONLY issue that can come up with the global market is advertising for local services and goods.
But that can be solved trivially, and their current systems already have locale-based MEDIA as it is, so it'd be a simple thing to do.
The other issues are all artificial, created by stupid people with small minds.

One of the most annoying things is the fact that TRANSLATION is used as an excuse to stop something coming out in the EU market. You know, that place that includes the UK, where English STARTED and requires zero translation to be understood with 95% accuracy.
Worse yet is the implication that countries DEFINE language, which is patently untrue since most countries have two large majority languages with at least 40% of speakers speaking it. (common being English-French, English-Spanish in the west, then over in the east the various Asian languages, the various Cyrillics and so on.)
There is nothing wrong with doing global releases and it has been done many times before.

Most videogames companies have gotten rid of silly regions. (besides Nintendo, stupidly. no wonder they are dying, NX better be region-free or they are dead to me)
Music, I don't think there is much reason for region locking that, but no doubt it happens. (not sure though since most of my music tastes are niche and ancient)
Books, not sure there either actually. I don't think any sort of region-locked business happens with books besides a small handful.
But for TV and film, it is all kinds of stupid.
If I speak Japanese, I can easily just order a Japanese game while sitting in my house in the UK. Likewise German if I want to experience censorship. (or the UK, or US, or anywhere that listens to whiny tumblrites these days)

Re:Fuck regions.

[zwarte piet]

Some regions more than others.

Locating users via billing address

[Anonymous Coward]

I would love Netflix to do this. I am sure my dad wouldn't mind me sending him some money to pay for my Netflix via his US credit card. Then I wouldn't have to stuff arse around with a VPN to get the US version of Netflix...
What I would love to happen though would be for content distributors to rewrite their distribution clauses to allow them to let Netflix show the content worldwide. Sure, this would give Netflix a hell of a lot of market clout but there are competitors to Netflix...

Re:Locating users via billing address

[zwarte piet]

But if you use that US account you paid with the US creditcard in another country than the US, you will still only get the content that is licenced for the country where you are unless you use a vpn.

content creators should shift the paradigm

[Anonymous Coward]

what if warner brothers went digital? issue there films or tv(per season) digitally. include some way to meet that advertisers return on investmenr be it in place(superman drinking a coke) or 30 second pieces in lieu of credits. who watches rhe scroll credits anyhow?... we used to use them as an excuse to not be shuffled out while they swept up...my pal was a stuntman / zombie food extra im trying to see his name in the credits....

One Down

[Anonymous Coward]

And, as it begins, it's just made probably the umpteenth innocent victim: moi. Though I can watch Netflix normally using either my laptop or my mobile devices, I cannot using my Roku. On the latter, capable of IPV4 only, I get the dreadful message about my being accessing Netflix via a proxy. Only I ain't.

I double checked the reputation of my IPV4 address and got nicked for being an SMTP output, which I ain't, and a Tor node, which I am, but merely a relay node, through which nothing exits except to other Tor nodes.

After arguing with Netflix, it came down to their way or the highway. I refuse to stop running the services I want on the Internet service that I pay for, so I took the highway. I can live without Netflix. Ever since cutting the cable years ago, I found out that I don't need that much TV. So, cutting the cable cutter is just a natural progression.

Good riddance!