Technology

Netflix VPN Ban Cannot Possibly Survive the Backlash

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Netflix has made quite a name for itself over the years, but it had one huge problem – it was limited to a few countries only. However, the company decided to change that and recently introduced its service in over 130 countries. Of course a lot of people in these countries welcomed Netflix’s arrival and subscribed to it without giving it a second thought. However, as soon as they started streaming, they realized that the service provided in their country didn’t come with as much content as they expected because of geo-restrictions.

This naturally angered them, but since they had already paid for the service, they searched for a workaround and found it in the form of virtual private network (VPN). Often described as primarily a tool to secure internet connection by tech sites like TechoMag, VPNs are also commonly used by people for bypassing geo-restrictions by switching their virtual location to another region. Netflix users kept no secret of their use of this technology as they regularly switched to US servers to access the content library there, which is by far the largest.

Netflix Errs

People around the globe were pretty happy with their subscriptions and VPN, but Netflix, seemingly under the pressure exerted by media giants and rights holders, decided to launch a crackdown on thousands of its users that were using VPN. The company justified this action by stating that illegal access to the content is disrespectful to the people who actually own the rights to that content, and therefore violation of location-based restrictions cannot be tolerated any longer. Anyone found to be using Netflix via VPN was to be immediate ban.

Bad Move

In our opinion, this is a really bad move from the streaming giant and will come back to haunt them. People pay for subscription because they want to access certain content, and when that content is not available in their region, they have to resort to VPNs. The subscription charges are more or less the same in every country, but if users are not in the US, they are given access to an extremely limited library, rendering the service completely useless. To counter this issue, people took help from VPNs, but Netflix has taken that option away from them as well, forcing them to make do with whatever limited content is available to them in their country despite paying almost the same amount of subscription fee as those in the US.

Failed Expansion

As mentioned earlier, this streaming service is now available almost all over the world, but why would anyone want to make use of it if they aren’t getting any value for money? Netflix was in a good position before when they were limited to a few countries, and were expected to gain even more popularity after expanding to additional countries. However, the decision to ban VPN has resulted in a completely different outcome. People are asking questions like why they should pay for access to limited films and shows when they can access a much bigger library through piracy? The resentment resulting from Netflix’s decision to side with the rights holders is driving people away and filling them with doubt.

The End Seems Near

Netflix should have let things stay as they were because no one was complaining about anything. People were gladly paying for the subscriptions and were getting access to a huge library of digital content using VPNs. However, now that they have lost the privilege of changing servers, there’s absolutely no reason for them to use Netflix anymore. It is very likely that ongoing subscription of a large number of people would be their last.