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Wisconsin VPN bill is 'going to be a disaster for everyone,' says online privacy nonprofit (www.pcgamer.com)

submitted 1 week ago by cm0002@toast.ooo to c/privacy@programming.dev

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Due to the UK's Online Safety Act implemented earlier this year, accessing my Bluesky DM's now means I need to allow a third-party service to scan my face, ID, or bank card. Understandably, that gives me the willies. So I can either simply never look at my messages again, whip out the likeness of Norman Reedus, OR I can log on via a VPN. However, the days of this vastly preferable third option may be numbered.

US states Wisconsin and Michigan have already proposed VPN crackdown bills aiming to close off this workaround—and the UK may be looking to follow suit. Online privacy nonprofit the Electronic Frontier Foundation recently criticised this strategy, taking aim at Wisconsin's bill in particular, saying that blocking the use of VPNs is "going to be a disaster for everyone."

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[–] cosmicrookie@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Espcially when done like Reddit did, where everything that is not marked as nonNSFW needs an account, even though its neutral

[–] Mikina@programming.dev 4 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Last time I checked, you cab use old.reddit.com to bypass this login requirement.

Reddit doesn't let me in with ny VPN on, though, so I just stopped using it.

[–] cosmicrookie@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago

I haven't used Reddit for a few years, but the issue is that a lot of search engine results point to answers that now require an account. It's no biggie, to find other results, but still annoying. Next time I stumble uppon this, i'll try with the old reddit version and see if this works, but I am not desperate

[–] Jason2357@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Reddit doesn’t let me in with ny VPN on, though, so I just stopped using it.

This is exactly what this law and others like it will cause across the Internet. More and more sites will just block VPN users.

[–] Mikina@programming.dev 4 points 1 week ago

They already do that. I can't watch YT, Reddit and have trouble logging in to FB. Cloudfare sometimes hits me with a endless captcha too.

I use Mullvad. Nothing of value was lost, and it has tremendously help me with finally stopping waating my time on those services.