When a website restricts users from accessing the content, it annoys them. However, such website restrictions are rising due to geo-restrictions and Governmental bans.
Also, some schools, businesses, and organizations have specific policies that hinder individuals from accessing certain content. But, it is disturbing for legitimate internet users to remain distant from their wanted content. Yet, the question arises of how to unblock websites.
10 Best Ways To unblock Websites
Many techniques are being described, but internet users cannot identify the correct tool to unblock websites due to the lack of appropriate explanation. But this article will tell you all the possible ways to unblock websites. Here we will describe all these website-unblocking tools that will provide you with enough understanding and ease to access such restricted content.
1. Use VPN
VPNs are the most concrete and authentic solutions to unblock websites. It could provide an efficient way to bypass restrictions without any side effects of being tracked or compromising privacy.
ACCORDING TO THE CONTENT PREFERENCE, a VPN service masks your actual IP address with the fake one. The IP change makes you a legitimate viewer of the content you want to view. With a VPN, you are presented with a wide variety of global content that can be accessed from almost any region. Also, the browsing speed while using a VPN remains almost undisturbed.
Due to the increased VPN need, scammers are offering fake VPN services, for which you must remain vigilant and try to avoid free VPNs. However, for this, you must intelligently select VPN providers with clear customer service policies. Therefore, choose a reputable VPN service such as NordVPN, ExpressVPN, and Surfshark VPN, which are trusted by customers and highly preferred by internet users.
2. Use TOR
TOR browser could be helpful in unblocking websites. It’s an easy-to-use software that also provides you anonymity. It obscures the IP address and keeps your data safe from prying eyes. Moreover, it passes the data from many nodes, preventing data scrambling.
You can download it by accessing the TOR site. One of the downsides of TOR is that while you are connected to it, you could experience slow online browsing. Also, due to increasing popularity, many cybercriminals use TOR to perform malicious activities.
3. HTTP and HTTPS
The first and initial step you should take while unblocking the website is to switch the preceding URL from HTTP to HTTPS. People often ignore this process; however, a single site version is sometimes blocked.
For instance, if you are trying to access Facebook and its HTTPS (https://www.facebook.com) version is blocked in your region, it could be possible that the site has HTTP (http://www.facebook.com) is accessible. Yet, in many institutes such as schools, the sites on standard HTTP internet port 80 are blocked, but port 443 is left unblocked, which is generally the HTTPS version of the site.
HTTPS and HTTP differentiate the same website, so the added ‘S’ in HTTP indicates the website is secure and encrypted. However, the URL containing HTTP shows that the website content is unsecured.
4. Use Portable Proxy Browser
A portable proxy browser could be downloaded to get a twice-efficient and advantageous version as a proxy alone. For instance, Kproxy could be portable or have the option to be installed. The most convenient feature while using the website browser is that it offers the site search without typing it in the main URL bar. You can easily access the blocked website by entering the URL in the middle search box.
5. Using a different DNS
You could also unblock websites by changing the DNS server. A DNS server is like an index maintained for the website URLs that you visit. For instance, when you enter the website link in your browser’s URL bar, your computer sends the access request to the DNS server, giving you the IP address for that site.
Therefore, when Internet service providers want to block a website, they remove the entries for that particular site. However, ISPs can also consider redirecting the request to a different website or a notice page.
To counter this issue, you could change the DNS server, yet, organizations or ISPs operate many free, fully-opened third-party DNS servers. However, the most popular DNS servers are Google DNS and OpenDNS. All you need to do to unblock websites is change your DNS to theirs.
Go to the Control panel for the Windows 7 system and then click the ‘Network and Internet’ folder. Now go to the ‘Network and Sharing Center’ and access the ‘Change adapter setting’ option. Now right-click on your network adapter, click Internet protocol version 4, and click ‘properties.’ Then click on ‘Use the following DNS server addresses and submit the DNS server of your choice. The server addresses for Google are 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4; for OpenDNS, they are 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220. Finally, after entering the server addresses, click ‘Ok’ to save the settings and reboot your computer.
6. Use Proxy Servers
While unblocking websites, proxy servers can be a helpful tool for mediating between your computer and the website you are accessing. When you are restricted from accessing a particular website, a proxy server could visit that site. The proxy server displays the web page, allowing you to connect.
You could unblock the website if you are not accessing the website directly. Various proxy servers are available online, for which a Google search of ‘Anonymous Proxy browsers‘ will give you a long list.
However, you should remember that access to free proxy servers could slow your browsing process and fail to display web pages efficiently. Also, you could face many intrusive advertisements while using proxy browsers which could disturb your online experience.
7. Use IP Instead of URL
One of the effective methods to unblock websites may include using IP instead of URLs. Sometimes the restricted websites are kept as a list of URLs, and using IP for that particular website may be effective. You could do a ping domain.com command in the Command prompt to obtain the IP address. Using the IP addresses is an easy way to access the blocked site of your region. However, this method would not work for a website that has blocked its IP address.
Yet, in this case, you could follow an alternative way. Use this IP address to enter the browser’s URL bar and press enter. The thing you need to do is run CMD on your PC and type ping ‘www.websitename.com.’ Now press ‘Enter,’ which will promptly return the IP address.
8. Access Translator Service
Most individuals may think that a translator could be used to unblock websites. However, sometimes organizations and even countries do not ban translator services. Therefore, converting the websites into some other language that you may know could help you bypass the restrictions. For this purpose, you may use Google Translate, Microsoft Translator, or Yahoo Babel Fish.
For instance, in Google Translate, you could enter the website URL you want to access and the language you wish to view the site content. Select the page language as anything but English; the translated language is English. You should be able to view the blocked website in English.
9. Use Extensions
For the blockades placed by institutes and offices, sometimes browser extensions could also help unblock websites. Sites such as Facebook or Youtube, which are dynamic, could be accessed using the extensions.
10. Avail of RSS Feed
RSS (Rich Site Summary) is the format to deliver the regularly changing content and help get the fresh content and read it easily. However, some websites do not have the RSS feed, but in such cases, you could avail of online services to create the feed. To unblock the website, you could get the RSS feed of that particular website and add it to your reader.
Conclusion
Much of the internet content nowadays is being blocked by users. This is the cause why many individuals are looking for techniques to unblock websites. However, they often couldn’t find an appropriate solution; instead, they got entangled in those techniques.
Here, through this guide, we have presented almost all the possible ways which could be helpful for you to unblock websites. Yet, you should intelligently apply these techniques according to the conditions.
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About the Author
Rebecca James is an IT consultant with forward thinking approach toward developing IT infrastructures of SMEs. She writes to engage with individuals and raise awareness of digital security, privacy, and better IT infrastructure.
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