HUNDREDS of illegal streaming sites have reportedly been blocked for viewers in the UK – and will be impossible to access even with a virtual private network (VPN).
Piracy sites with servers in the UK were blocked earlier this month by Cloudflare, an internet infrastructure giant that acts as the middleman between websites and their visitors, TechRadar reported.
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Those visiting the pirate streaming sites are expected to be met with Cloudflare’s Error HTTP 451 – a block reserved for law-breaking websites only.
Pirate streaming sites are already blocked by most internet service providers in the UK, such as BT, Virgin Media and Sky.
People can sometimes evade restrictions by using a VPN – a service which keeps your internet activities private.
But due to a recent legal order, Cloudflare has reportedly blocked access to up to 200 pirate streaming websites.
And this block cannot be bypassed with a simple VPN.
Cloudflare is the company connecting web users to their desired websites – which means they can step in and block access at any time.
The company uses geo-blocking, meaning the websites are simply unavailable in the UK.
While the sites were barred earlier this month, the legal case calling for their blocking may have started as early as February 2024, TechRadar reported.
A private law firm delivered a court order to Google, requesting to block 14 piracy sites, according to the Lumen Database.
However, Torrentfreak estimates that as many as 200 pirate domains could be affected.
It forms part of a European crackdown on piracy.
In May, French streaming giant Canal+ scored a legal victory when a landmark ruling ordered five popular VPN providers to block access to over 200 illegal sports streaming sites.
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