Geo Blocking

[Balaji Loganathan]

Hi,
This site http://sho.com/ can't be viewed by Non-US countries!.It says "We at Showtime Online express our apologies; however, these pages are intended for access only from within the United States...."
I'm accessing this site from europe.
How can i achieve this for my site using java and javascript related technolgies.
Regards
Balaji

[Thomas Paul]

They must be looking at the IP address of the requestor.

[Ron Newman]

However it's done, it's a BAD idea. Please don't do this.

[Michael Ernest]

I would guess it's done by domain rather than IP.

[Ashok Mash]

http://www.thenetworkadministrator.com/geoblocking.htm
I don't know is this GEO-blocking thingee is a useful method or utter stupidity, because AFASIK, its not difficult to mask IPs.

[Michael Ernest]

Enlightening article. As it mentions, masking IPs isn't the issue. You can do that very easily. Getting the IP addresses that represent an entire country, that's hard. This is why I suggest domains as a more likely alternative, but Doug Chick says he just uses IPs, so who am I.
I can certainly see a use for Geo blocking for small, "private" sites. I'm not aware of any "internet ethic" that says every site must say "please come in."
That said, anyone who thinks JavaRanch is headed this way is getting worried about nothing. This is not a JR issue in any way.

[Ron Newman]

If it's truly supposed to be private (and Showtime is not an example of this), use password protection, not geoblocking.

[Mapraputa Is]

Originally posted by Michael Ernest:
I can certainly see a use for Geo blocking for small, "private" sites. I'm not aware of any "internet ethic" that says every site must say "please come in."

You can start from here.

[Michael Ernest]

Tim Berners-Lee's personal notes on Web design? What does that have to do with the rules for accessing any one site?
So it's callous for a web site to advertise widely but restrict who can get to their stuff. But let's say Site A emails the entire world. You or I decide to visit it; we get a blank screen with a text field for a password. No welcome, no explanation -- just a request for a password.
I don't see a qualitative difference between a (techno-politically correct?) password block and a geoblock. If I'm not allowed to a site I've been invited to, I don't think to rail against the method of blocking, I'm just peeved by the block.
So what's the difference in your mind, anyone?

[Ron Newman]

The difference is that if I have password access to the site, I can get to it whether I'm here, or in Italy, or in India. No matter where I am, I can register for and log into the site.

[David O'Meara]

If you want to view it remotely, just translate it to Moron

http://rinkworks.com/dialect/dialectp.cgi?dialect=moron&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsho.com&inside=1
The translation page is in the USA http://rinkworks.com/dialect/ and makes the request for you. Having access to a proxy in the USA could do it too, but The Dialectizer is funnier
Dave

[Michael Ernest]

Originally posted by Ron Newman:
The difference is that if I have password access to the site, I can get to it whether I'm here, or in Italy, or in India. No matter where I am, I can register for and log into the site.

Clearly if you're blocking a whole country it's because you don't care who is trying to use it, you only care where they're connecting from.
I (not JavaRanch, just so we're clear) might block, say, Malaysia, for the the same reasons I block AOL users: log analysis tells me half my problems come from such places. I could cut my (still coming in!) NIMDA crap by half if I did that.
As for the people who wanted to access my site legitimately, I simply say, "sorry, until I can get AOL and Malaysian authorties to crack down on their users, no can do."

[Balaji Loganathan]

I have found this site!.
Which is inviting me with my city name exactly.
http://www.geobutton.com/geophrase.htm, i found this site at this site, lets stay in JR.
Regards
Balaji

[Balaji Loganathan]

Originally posted by Ron Newman:
However it's done, it's a BAD idea. Please don't do this.

Well i'm trying to develop a web service for my company which will be free for first 2 years,after that this service will be available(free of cost) for countries which explicitly make us a request.So i need a country based blocking!.
So i don't see its a Bad idea.
But DOM reply is worrying me!

Regards
Balaji

[Thomas Paul]

Originally posted by Balaji Loganathan:

Well i'm trying to develop a web service for my company which will be free for first 2 years,after that this service will be available(free of cost) for countries which explicitly make us a request.So i need a country based blocking!.
So i don't see its a Bad idea.
But DOM reply is worrying me!

Regards
Balaji

It isn't going to work. Let's say you block my country but allow the US. I go to a US ISP and buy a website. I write a quick Java servlet that opens up a URL passed to it and forwards the contents of the URL to my browser. Now the request appears to be coming from the US.

[Thomas Paul]

Originally posted by Balaji Loganathan:
I have found this site!.
Which is inviting me with my city name exactly.

It told me, "Special welcome to our visitors from Hudson, United States." I have no idea where Hudson, United States is.

[Hema Menon]

Originally posted by Thomas Paul:
It told me, "Special welcome to our visitors from Hudson, United States." I have no idea where Hudson, United States is.

For me it worked!
"Special welcome to our visitors from Dallas, United States."

Hema

[R K Singh]

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Special welcome to our visitors from Cuddalore, India.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Only bold part is correct in my case

[Michael Ernest]

Possibly some kind of screen scraper program.

[Balaji Loganathan]

Originally posted by Thomas Paul:

It isn't going to work. Let's say you block my country but allow the US. I go to a US ISP and buy a website. I write a quick Java servlet that opens up a URL passed to it and forwards the contents of the URL to my browser. Now the request appears to be coming from the US.

[Balaji Loganathan]

Originally posted by Ravish Kumar:
Special welcome to our visitors from Cuddalore, India.
Only bold part is correct in my case

Are you in Bangalore ? one of my Bangalore friend told me its showing his city name correctly.