Hi all! I live in Russia. Over the past two years, we have blocked almost all major VPN services, including AdGuard. Against this backdrop, I have a few questions:
How does a blocked VPN service continue to function normally? I mean, in Russia you can connect to any of their servers. Why, then, did other blocked VPN services turn out to be completely inoperative?
How can a blocked VPN service accept MIR (Russian National Payment System) cards for payment?
Hi all! I live in Russia.
I’m sorry about that.
How can a blocked VPN service accept MIR (Russian National Payment System) cards for payment?
I don’t know if Proton VPN is blocked or not, but this should help with the payment question if not.
I think you misunderstood me. It seems to me that AdGuard is somehow cooperating with the Russian authorities.
That seems to be a real stretch conclusion, just because they accept a form of paiement.
Either way, i believe the “Adguard VPN” is a different entity from the Adguard adblocking team, and as such, isn’t recommended by PrivacyGuides per their requirements.
I’ve never used their VPN. I’ve used their ad blocking service for years, and it has always worked great. I’ve been concerned about this since the war started. Any other ad blocker recommendations to consider?
NextDNS and PiHole if you are willing to self-host
like Iran and China, Russia blocks common VPN protocols (Wireguard, Openvpn, etc) so normal VPNs doesnt work but Adguard uses its own obfuscation protocol to bypass that if you dont trust them you can use Protonvpn or better option is Geph but their free tier is pretty slow if you dont trust them either you can make your own vpn GitHub - XTLS/Xray-core: Xray, Penetrates Everything. Also the best v2ray-core, with XTLS support. Fully compatible configuration. best Xray protocol right now VLESS Reality and obviously dont buy vps from Russian providers
Today IVPN stopped working in Russia. But Adguard works. Tell me, please, those who understand VPN.
Can a VPN provider bypass VPN protocol blocking or is it unrealistic?
Read the message above Adguard uses its own obfuscation protocol to bypass restriction also you can make your own vpn with a panel like hiddify GitHub - hiddify/hiddify-config: multi-user anti-filtering panel, with an effortless installation and supporting more than 20 protocols to circumvent filtering plus the telegram proxy. you dont need a domain to setup VLESS Reality
Just a note guys, please keep things in line with the code of conduct. I do not want to see posts here which are racist.
It depends on how they’re blocking VPNs. If they’re doing so purely on the IP address, then that will be a “whack-a-mole” game, new servers will come online, and they will be blocked. From what I’ve heard Russia at this point is doing it that way.
If they are doing deep packet inspection (something that occurs in China and Iran), then it won’t matter, as protocols like OpenVPN and WireGuard have distinct characteristics that can be “blocked” without needing to know about every server.
There are a couple of possibilities, the first might be to hire a server outside of Russia, and create your “own” VPN server. The threat model is the government is spying on you. A unique server may evade filtering, but will not be anonymous to remote hosts (because you’re the only one using it). Unfortunately at the moment that is difficult due to sanctions around the world being placed on Russia. In some places VPN servers are “exempt” from sanctions, and therefore can process transactions with cryptocurrencies.
Dealing with a VPN company directly may be easier because both the UK and US have exemptions for that type of business.
As for accepting Mir, a lot of payment processors won’t be able to do that. I was under the impression that only worked domestically anyway. In the past another workaround was UnionPay (though expensive I am told), maybe not anymore. ProtonVPN have an article.
Another solution might be to try obtain some cryptocurrency from an exchange not located in a country currently blocking Russian bank accounts. It would then be possible to transfer that to a Monero wallet, and pay with that.
The solution you probably want to try:
There is no reason to believe that is the case. There are people at Adguard who work/live in Ukraine though. They are quite clear about that though: Official response from AdGuard to SetApp allegations.