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submitted 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

Prominent backbench MP Sarah Champion launched a campaign against VPNs previously, saying: “My new clause 54 would require the Secretary of State to publish, within six months of the Bill’s passage, a report on the effect of VPN use on Ofcom’s ability to enforce the requirements under clause 112.

"If VPNs cause significant issues, the Government must identify those issues and find solutions, rather than avoiding difficult problems.” And the Labour Party said there were “gaps” in the bill that needed to be amended.

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[-] [email protected] 364 points 3 weeks ago

Just to fast-forward this dumb cat-and-mouse thing, the next step is people go back to torrenting their porn and deeper down the rabbit hole of garbage "free" websites skirting the rules.

As always, the UK is useful on the international stage because sometimes you need to be able to point at some idiot trying dumb stuff to explain to people why dumb stuff is dumb.

[-] [email protected] 111 points 3 weeks ago

It does feel that way. UK bureaucracy is just one giant guinea pig stunting it's own commonwealth.

Next someone will try enforcing paper umbrellas as a solution for climate action. We'll all say, "That won't work". They'll still do it; it won't work. We'll say, "We told you so", and it won't get reversed because they're already aiming at the next foot to shoot.

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[-] [email protected] 63 points 3 weeks ago

100% Brexit quickly shut up similar movements when people saw how badly it went

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[-] [email protected] 234 points 3 weeks ago

This kinda proves that it was never about the children. How many children have know how and the means to buy a VPN subscription?

[-] [email protected] 47 points 3 weeks ago

Still an important part. Free VPNs that spy on you are a thing, but work

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[-] [email protected] 37 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

A lot more than you know, I knew how to use it since middle school.

And if they don't know they will use Reddit to find out how to access the sites:

https://reddit.adminforge.de/r/teenagers/comments/tv70x0/do_yall_know_a_good_vpn/?

https://redlib.baczek.me/r/teenagers/comments/1m7bp6b/turns_out_its_comically_easy_to_bypass_reddits/?

Don't underestimate kids.

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[-] [email protected] 173 points 3 weeks ago
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[-] [email protected] 167 points 3 weeks ago

the Government must identify those issues and find solutions, rather than avoiding difficult problems

The government: Parents have you tried being a parent to your children?

Parents: Oh lord no that's too difficult can't you just, I don't know lol, ban it or something?

[-] [email protected] 51 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

In my English textbook, ca. 2007 there was a comic of a child in a cage hanging outside the house. The father told the neighbor something like "This way they get out of the house, but stay off the streets."

I think that hit quite well, what many consider parenting in the UK.

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[-] [email protected] 152 points 3 weeks ago

This ends with just another war on encryption.

When encryption is legal, they can't know what is going on between two points. They going to make is so we can only have encryption to nodes they trust?

It is dangerously technologically illiterate to wage war on encryption.

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[-] [email protected] 123 points 3 weeks ago

Best of luck with that, idiots. How are you planning to tell the difference between my personal VPN and my work VPN?

[-] [email protected] 50 points 3 weeks ago

Next step: ban on remote work.

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[-] [email protected] 112 points 3 weeks ago

If they outlaw VPNs then all internet-connected businesses will flee and everyone will just move to the dark net. Then you’ve got a whole other problem.

These ancient tyrants are in over their heads.

[-] [email protected] 34 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Selfishly, I think this is great for I2P/Snowflake/Tor. The incoming legitimate traffic helps to protect its most vulnerable users.

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[-] [email protected] 86 points 3 weeks ago

That sounds a bit like fear mongering from Reform: a VPN is safety 101 when using public networks, and most businesses make use of VPNs to secure their data. They are also a key component if WFH (you use the company VPN).

If Labour are stupid enough to go after VPN usage, I suspect it would guarantee their loss at the next election.

[-] [email protected] 47 points 3 weeks ago

Eh, I dunno. The vast majority have no idea what a VPN is. If a VPN ban benefits Rupert fucking Murdoch then the tabloids will wang on about how they're used by paedophiles and people smugglers and that'll be that.

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[-] [email protected] 80 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

It would have been smarter for the UK to mandate that every ISP must provide a family filter for free as part of their service. Something that is optional and can be turned on or off by the account holder but allows parents to set filters (and curfews) if they want. They could even require that ISPs require new signups to affirm if they want it on or off by default so people with families are more likely to start with it enabled.

[-] [email protected] 32 points 3 weeks ago

The problem is that content filters don't work all that well in the age of https everywhere. I mean, you can block the pornhub.com domain, that's fairly straightforward ... but what about reddit.com which has porn content but also legitimately non-porn content. Or closer to home: any lemmy instance.

I think it would be better if politicians stopped pearl clutching and realized that porn perhaps isn't the worst problem in the world. Tiktok and influencer brainrot, incel and manosphere stuff, rage baiting social media, etc. are all much worse things for the psyche of young people, and they're doing exactly jack shit about that.

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[-] [email protected] 71 points 3 weeks ago

Damn. Labor really wants to lose that election to Farage. Good luck to Corbyn and Sultana, I guess.

[-] [email protected] 54 points 3 weeks ago

Farage: Gets elected.

Everyone: At least you'll abolish the OSA!

Farage: Nah, I said that because it would make me popular. Amma use the OSA to ban things I consider "woke".

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[-] [email protected] 67 points 3 weeks ago

"It has come to our attention that we haven't fascismed hard enough, nor in sufficient detail"

[-] [email protected] 64 points 3 weeks ago

Maybe if they see significant issues with the populace adhereing to this law they should identify the solution of revoking the unpopular law.

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[-] [email protected] 62 points 3 weeks ago

Nothing will meaningfully improve until the rich fear for their lives

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[-] [email protected] 61 points 3 weeks ago

Come on UK, just skip all the boring parts and make unremovable collars for everyone fitted with GPS, cameras and miniature bombs that can be remotely detonated. After all, that's the only way to make sure nobody is doing bad, very bad illegal stuff and to PROTECT THE CHILDREN, isn't it? Fucking hell, these fucks really are trying to create a bloody dystopia...

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[-] [email protected] 55 points 3 weeks ago

I’d email my MP to ask why this Labour Government is using the BBC to promote Reform talking points and implementing brain dead Reform policies, but I don’t expect anything other than the blandest party line response.

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[-] [email protected] 54 points 3 weeks ago

"We will force you to do what we want", democracy in action

[-] [email protected] 52 points 3 weeks ago

Isn't this currently what Russia is trying to do with their internet?

[-] [email protected] 32 points 3 weeks ago

It's something russia has been doing for a decade and got pretty good at.

A long term blanket vpn ban is not compatible with a modern digital infrastructure, but with certain protocols (openvpn, wireguard) they can detect their usage and filter them out when necessary.

It does require a lot of expensive DPI (deep packet inspection) hardware I'm not sure UK has, so building a Great Firewall of Britain (Hadrian's Firewall?) will take some time.

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[-] [email protected] 51 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

"Safety" meanwhile these same mp's can't budget can't run critical public services like bloody hospitals.

But don't worry, your thoughts and activity are policed.

Democratic failure to prioritise and run a country at its finest on display for the world to see. The waste is astounding.

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[-] [email protected] 47 points 3 weeks ago
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[-] [email protected] 47 points 2 weeks ago

Funny how its always so important to ban useful and empowering things for citizens in the name of safety but someone we can't ban business practices that cause mass extinctions, change the climate, impoverish the working class or kill enough of us to only be seen as a statistic instead of people. If they actually cared about safety, they would be banning the things that cause mass suffering and death, not VPNs. We should be opposed to these kinds of bans on the principle that it further disempowered us so we are less able to deal with the threats of all the mass suffering and death that they refuse to keep us safe from.

[-] [email protected] 46 points 3 weeks ago

Why not just ban all human rights while you're at it?

[-] [email protected] 32 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Little by little!
Can't do it all at once or the ~~peasants~~ populace might catch on!

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[-] [email protected] 44 points 3 weeks ago
[-] [email protected] 44 points 3 weeks ago

If this comes to anything I'm moving to somewhere in the EU and pursuing citizenship there. This is clearly not about protecting the children anymore (not that it ever was).

[-] [email protected] 42 points 3 weeks ago

EU is about to do the exact same thing. Norway is the place to be. That's where I went - at least according to my ip address.

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[-] [email protected] 44 points 3 weeks ago

They can come and pry TOR from my cold dead hands lmfao

this law can eat shit. i ain't gonna dox myself and feed my personal info to companies. maybe they should take this as a hint that most people care about their privacy

if you don't want kids seeing NSFW stuff be an actual parent and don't raise your kids on the internet??

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[-] [email protected] 43 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

apparently having a functioning brain isn't a requirement of being an mp

but of course we knew that when she did this in 2019:

On 16 July 2019, Champion stated: "If my party comes out as a remain party rather than trying to find a deal or >rather than trying to exit, I can't support that, it goes against democracy". She said she would rather support a "no-deal Brexit" than remain in the EU, as she believed Labour had to deliver the result of the 2016 referendum.

[-] [email protected] 42 points 2 weeks ago

If VPNs cause significant issues, the Government must identify those issues and find solutions, rather than avoiding difficult problems

Your law is the difficult problem you daft cunt

[-] [email protected] 39 points 2 weeks ago

Lol what is going on over there. The UK is becoming more dystopian by the day.

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[-] [email protected] 37 points 3 weeks ago

Not even China can ban VPN entirely, because businesses use it as a security measure.

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[-] [email protected] 37 points 3 weeks ago

Show me a ban that didn’t came with 10x problems. People have their needs even the filthy ones. Especially the filthy ones. Hence will find a way to fulfill it. If there’s no legal way to do so the demand will create an alternative market for it to match the demand…more trouble on the way if that’s the lane the UK choose

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[-] [email protected] 36 points 3 weeks ago

But they can't seem to muster up the "political" will to tax the rich

[-] [email protected] 36 points 3 weeks ago

Next up, zeros and/or ones

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[-] [email protected] 34 points 3 weeks ago

Labour are not governing for the people, and they are not the Labour party anymore.

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[-] [email protected] 33 points 3 weeks ago

The UK is the testing grounds. After they figure it out, they’ll be rolling it out everywhere else.

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[-] [email protected] 32 points 3 weeks ago

This online safety bill is dishonest. This has nothing to do with safety and everything to do with money.

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this post was submitted on 29 Jul 2025
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