We have some bad news for Aussie Hulu fans: the US-based video streaming service has just blocked international customers using virtual private networks (VPNs). In other words, you now have one less way to access movies and TV shows without resulting to piracy. Here’s what you can do about it.
According to a recent TorrentFreak report, Hulu began denying VPN users access sometime last week. In place of the requested video, users now receive the following message:
Based on your IP address, we noticed you are trying to access Hulu through an anonymous proxy tool. Hulu is not currently available outside the U.S. If you’re in the U.S., you’l need to disable your anonymizer to access videos on Hulu.
As the above message indicates, this latest geo-blocking measure is also ensnaring legitimate US customers who simply want to protect their privacy. Whoops.
So is there anything Australian users can do about it? That largely depends on your VPN provider of choice. Some of the bigger VPN services such as TorGuard have already begun deploying countermeasures and will set up dedicated IPs which are likely to remain undetected.
Alternatively, it might be time to switch to a streaming service that isn’t trying to block your business so zealously. Click here for the Lifehacker Guide to streaming overseas content.
[Via Gizmodo]
Comments
11 responses to “Can’t Access Hulu Anymore? This Is Why”
Still able to access via Unblock-US, although I cancelled my Hulu Plus subscription after getting sick issues with streams dropping out at ads and not resuming from the same place.
“Good.” – Rupert Murdoch
Just like taking down a torrent site, a million more pop up in its place. I seriously doubt they can block every single VPN and smart dns provider out there.
This is why people pirate!
Having said that though, all of the vpn services I have active accounts with (Torguard, proxy.sh, hidemyass, SlickVPN, private internet access, Kepard, NordVPN, earthvpn, purevpn, tunnelbear and even hotspot shield) all work fine with hulu.
Yes I’m addicted to trying VPNs, in reality it looks like proxy.sh and Torguard are the only two I will keep. (NordVPN is great but their glacial response to the heartbleed bug did not impress me at all)
Even the virtually free Hideninja VPN (the use all servers unlimited for life pro version costs less than $10) works just fine.
So anyway which VPNs are alleged not to work?
More to the point, how are they going to block literally several million ip addresses owned by vpn providers without impacting any legit users?
There are a number of ways.
Fist is to just hit the low hanging fruit, ban all the AWS and Azure IP (and the like) addresses to pick up people who run their own proxy/vpn/tunnel in the “cloud”.
Then some simple hueristics will trim a lot more over time. “10 accounts log in from x.y.z.a address at the same time? Ban it”
Over time they will be able to filter out most people using the service in a way their licensing terms with Hollywood (and Murdoch) don’t allow.
People pirate because they want content for free instead of paying for it. Then they whinge when their favourite series gets canned after 2 seasons due to poor ratings.
That is so true, which is why people are complaining about a change on a service which isn’t piracy and which allows them to pay for content they want (through ads or a Hulu Plus subscription).
No, wait. That’s the exact opposite of what you said.
Does anyone know if Hola still works?
Just tested with The Daily Show. Yep, still works like a charm.
Not many of us are using VPN’s, Unblock-Us, Getflix and Unotelly are DNS spoofers. Unblock-us definitely still works.
I suggest dns-trick as smartdns service which is not recognized by hulu as an anonymous proxy and allow you to watch it without any problem or bandwidth loss