Many services on the Internet may be geographically restricted. This means that, for example, you can be traveling in another country and not have access to your Netflix series or you cannot enter an application that you use. The reasons are diverse, from censorship in some territories to commercial issues of the platforms. To avoid this, users usually use VPN. Now, what alternatives are there?
Alternatives to a VPN to avoid blocks
What a VPN basically does is hide the real IP address and, therefore, the location where we are. We connect through an intermediate server instead of going directly to a web page and that it can know where we are. But sometimes these services don’t work well or we just want to try other alternatives. There are several, as you will see.
Tor Browser
One of them is to use the Tor browser. In this case the connection will work through multiple nodes. That is, when we enter a web page from a computer, that connection is not direct. What it really does is go through multiple nodes or servers until it reaches the end. In this way it is impossible to trace the origin.
The Tor browser is interesting because it is free and because you can use it on both your computer and mobile. When you navigate through it, the location will be hidden and you can bypass possible geo-blocks. Of course, although it is very safe, you should bear in mind that it is quite slow, so it is not the best option for watching videos on the Internet.
Proxy usage
Another very common alternative to avoid geoblocks on the Internet is to use a proxy. You can see the differences between proxy and VPN to watch Netflix but the objective is partly the same: it acts as an intermediary server so that the connection is not direct. In this way they can modify the location and allow access to sites that may be restricted.
As was the case with using the Tor browser, you can also experience speed issues when using a proxy. It is important that you choose one that works correctly and that allows you to access the network in the best possible conditions. There are quite a few options on the Internet, so you can try.
SmartDNS
One more option that you can have as an alternative to VPNs is to use Smart DNS. What it does in this case is to redirect DNS queries through a remote server. It doesn’t have security features like a VPN as it doesn’t hide IP and it doesn’t encrypt internet traffic either. In that sense it is different.
But if what you are really interested in is being able to access geographically blocked services, Smart VPN is one more solution. What it does is hide the DNS address and thus allow access to content that is only available depending on which location. As a positive point is the speed, since it is faster.
In short, to be able to avoid geographic blocking on the Internet, you have different options beyond the use of a VPN. You can try alternatives like Smart DNS, proxy or even Tor browser. Each of these options has its positive and negative points, but in all cases you will be able to avoid geographical restrictions.
