Re: [or-talk] ABC blocking Tor servers?

[Sam Creasey <sammy@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Mon, Dec 11, 2006 at 08:07:10AM -0800, Brian C wrote:
> ABC makes available some full episodes of their TV programs from their
> website.  I operate a tor server from the single static IP assigned to
> me by my ISP.  My ISP is a Covad reseller and my IP address resolves to
> a Covad block located in San Francisco, CA.
> 
> When I go to: http://dynamic.abc.go.com/streaming/landing
> 
> I get the message: "Only viewers within the United States can watch
> these full-length episodes."
> 
> I'm hoping other tor server operators, located in the United States,
> will check this out by visiting the above address from their tor server
> IP, so we can determine whether ABC is simply blocking the list of all
> tor servers.

Tried this from the server hosting fusarium...   I got the following
result which appears to confirm your findings:

% wget  --bind-address=72.5.28.193 http://dynamic.abc.go.com/streaming/landing
--12:35:03--  http://dynamic.abc.go.com/streaming/landing
           => `landing'
Resolving dynamic.abc.go.com... 199.181.133.159
Connecting to dynamic.abc.go.com[199.181.133.159]:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 15,059 [text/html]

% wget http://dynamic.abc.go.com/streaming/landing
--12:36:04--  http://dynamic.abc.go.com/streaming/landing
           => `landing.1'
Resolving dynamic.abc.go.com... 199.181.133.159
Connecting to dynamic.abc.go.com[199.181.133.159]:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 20,795 [text/html]

% diff landing landing.1 | head
50c50
< var pagename = "PAGE_LANDING_ERROR_COUNTRY_X";
---
> var pagename = "PAGE_LANDING";

So, yeah, the first version from fusarium's ip definitely seems to
indicate that that server is specifically blocking tor servers.  The
address which worked for me is in the same netblock as the address
which was denied.

Interesting.

-- Sam