Number of restrictions and bans on the internet is increasing every day. Especially governments are putting censorship on the web more often than usual in order to control what their citizens can see. It is absolutely frustrating when you cannot access what you wish online. We all imagine that the internet should be the same for everyone, and it is our decision what we want to see. Well governments, schools, ISPs and others think differently.

There are ways to bypass these blocks and bring back the open internet. These ways include VPN, Tor, proxy and using IP rather than URL.

4 ways to bypass restrictions on the internet

VPN for accessing blocked websites

Virtual Private Network is the easiest and most assuring way to access blocked websites. It encrypts your traffic and changes your IP address so you can appear to be in any corner of the world, depends where your VPN has servers. Surfshark is a good option for a VPN, since it has many fast servers worldwide and manages to bypass many restrictions put on the web, even the great Firewall of China. It will also ensure your security and anonymity online. You can get Surfshark with a discount with this link.

Tor for browsing websites anonymously

Another option is using Tor browser for open internet. It uses layered encryption to make your connection absolutely anonymous, which also lets you bypass restrictions since nobody knows it is you and where you are. A major downside of Tor is that it slows down your internet speed a lot, since your traffic goes through several layers of encryption.

Proxy for your browser

A simple way to bypass restrictions is to use a proxy. Same as a VPN it routes your traffic and bypasses restrictions, but unlike the VPN it works only with specific applications like browsers. There are free proxies but they are not very safe to use, since they tend to collect users data, it is actually better to use a VPN for all the time browsing, and if you want just occasionally bypass some restrictions proxy maybe fine to use.

Use IP rather URL

Each website has an IP address and someone blocking the website might have just stored URL as banned instead of IP, which can help you access the website. To get the IP address you need to use ping domain(dot)com command in the Command Prompt. Websites sometimes hide their IP, if this happens this way won’t work, but it is worth a try. But if you get the IP address just put it in the web browser’s address bar and hit enter.