Virgin media, Pirates Bay and US TV shows

[Robin]

OK, I'll display my ignorance and ask how using the hosts file could work when we have already established that VM are not relying on DNS and are blocking html traffic from 194.71.107.15?

As for empirical evidence, adding to the hosts file in XP "194.71.107.15 mypbay.com" leads straight o the usual VM page about the High Court order

[John Rumm]

Well there was the suggestion that the block was done using cleenfeed, which is supposed to be a little more subtle than a simple IP block.

The way the cleanfeed system works (from what is actually published about it - so this may of course be completely wrong or missing vital details) suggests that the ISP's router first compares the result of the target URLs DNS lookup, with an IP blacklist. If it matches, it does not use that as a reason alone to filter it then and there, but instead routes the traffic to a web proxy for closer scrutiny. This can then block individual items based on their URL. Hence it should be possible to silently block either a single page of a site, or even a single image on a page etc without knobbling the whole site.

So if

resolves to a IP that is blacklisted, it goes to the proxy, and there the filter may be set to match say but no other pages on the site. Leaving most of it retrievable, other than that image. Hence requests for should still be visible even though the IP of the site as a whole is flagged as "in need of closer checking".

Based on that analysis, a new DNS entry that points bsite.com at the IP of asite.com could mean that a request for

still triggers the routing via the proxy, but that the actual URL comparison at the proxy stage would not see it as the same image. (since there may be a legitimate image with the same name on the alternate site that it should not block)

(this being similar to the way for example apache running virtual hosting will use the URL in the GET request to work out which sites pages to serve when its hosting multiple sites on the same server)

Using a target of just the root of the site, or a named sub page on it?

e.g. what about:

a non infringing page on the site)

However it could be a fairly crude IP based (or IP address and TCP port number) block and not anything subtle. (possibly understandable since the site in question is large enough to need dedicated hosting and not shared hosting)

[Robin]

Thanks for the explanation.

I tried the root and an individual page ("legal" as I thought the lawyers might want to allow access to the lawyers' missives).

That page also hits the bloc

and also possibly not too surprising given the High Court reportedly ordered the ISPs to block the site (ie the whole site).

[The Natural Philosopher]

Not for me.

[dennis]

I think virgin run all http traffic through their proxy, they did when I was with them.

[John Rumm]

Yup, my point really being that blocking an IP alone does not always equate to blocking the whole site. Depending on the scale of the hosting arrangements for the site in question, it can do anything from blocking it and hundreds of unrelated sites at the same time, to blocking just one machine from a whole cluster of servers that ultimately has little effect on general accessibility.

[John Rumm]

No, well its fine for me as well... its only a few of the larger ISPs at the mo that are implementing a block.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Mind ypu its covered in adware, so I gave up as soon as it told me my windows system was slow and probably infected.

Odd, since I have Linux...

[John Rumm]

I have AdBlock loaded in FF, so I never see ads anyway ;-)