Netflix starts blocking proxies in Australia

Johannesburg - Video streaming service Netflix has started blocking proxies and unblockers in Australia after the company said it would crack down on such technologies.

Proxies and unblockers allow users to ‘fool’ services such as Netflix into thinking that their internet addresses reside in a different country.

The technologies have been used by some internet viewers around the world to access Netflix’s US service. The US version of Netflix has more content available than, for example, the South African version of Netflix because of regional content rights

After Netflix launched in an extra 130 countries around the world earlier this month, the service promised to clamp down on proxies and unblockers from accessing its service.

And days later an Australian proxy service called uFlix has reported that some of its users have started seeing the following notification when trying to access the US version of Netflix: “You seem to be using an unblocker or proxy. Please turn off any of these services and try again.”

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uFlix further explained the situation in a post on its website.

“Some users are starting to have issues with Netflix blocking non-Australian content when going through uFlix,” said the company.

“Though it is only affecting a few users at the moment, we expect this number to grow. We are working on a solution to get around these new measures and apologise for the inconvenience to those who are currently only getting Australian Netflix,” said the service.

The move by Netflix to block the unblockers and proxies comes after some other proxy services around the world have said they’ll challenge the move by adapting their technologies.

TorGuard VPN, a popular anonymous proxy service, said it’s users don’t have to worry about Netflix’s latest move.

“For those of you who rely on TorGuard VPN service to unblock Netflix content unrestricted, you don’t have to worry,” TorGuard wrote in a blog post.

“Netflix will be pushing this plan forward soon, and when that happens, TorGuard will immediately deploy new server IP (internet protocol) addresses so users can still bypass blocks,” the VPN service provider wrote.