Whether you want to access blocked websites on a blocked school network, bypass software that circumvents parental control, or take on your government’s censorship restrictions, this article will tell you about different methods for accessing blocked websites on your computer. Please keep in mind that some of these techniques may not work in some countries, such as China, because these countries have particularly advanced censorship tools.
It is also crucial to know that while some of these techniques offer a high degree of anonymity, it is very likely that your identity will be uncovered by law enforcement agencies – something you should definitely think about when pursuing illegal activities. Let us see how you can easily get to blocked websites from your browser.
Proxy sites are nothing more than a kind of proxy server. Instead of connecting directly to the websites that are blocked at your site, you first connect to a proxy server that redirects you to the blocked website, giving you easy access.
There are several such proxy sites on the Internet, and I could provide you with a huge list of them. However, below are the most commonly used online proxy websites:
Surfing through a TOR network with its free open source software is another way to get to blocked websites on your computer and remain anonymous. The TOR network, similar to the Deep Web and its hidden services, was introduced by the United States Army to provide a very high level of anonymity to its users.
TOR works by sending your traffic through several networks of other people (called “nodes”) that also use TOR, so the destination website does not know who you are and your ISP (Internet Service Provider) does not know what you are browsing. Likewise, your computer is also used as a hub for other people to route their TOR traffic through, much like peer-to-peer file transfer.
Because your ISP doesn’t know what site you’re browsing, TOR is a good way to bypass blocked sites on your school or office network. Some sites still block TOR traffic, or you may be confronted with a human verification system when surfing with TOR – this is because the high traffic from a node on the network exposes some sites to suspicion of abuse. But don’t worry, this is only a problem with a smaller number of locations.
Use ‘Google Cache’ to get around Blocked Websites
This is a surefire way that works on almost all websites. In this way you will not get to the actual website, but to a “screenshot” of the website, which has already been created by Google. Sadly, however, such screenshots do not contain any working games or videos. Consequently, this method is best suited for reading blocked educational content on websites such as Hubpages or Wikipedia. Some people have even used it on community sites like Cracked.com and Reddit.
How to do it:
Open your browser application and go to the ‘Google’ homepage.
After you find the URL of the website you want to access, copy and paste it into the Google search box as: cache:www.yoururl.com
Click on Search. At this stage, a screenshot of the website is displayed in your browser. The link is generally something like http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/…
Use ‘Proxy IPs’ to Get on Blocked Websites
Some browsers offer to utilize a PROXY IP address, which allows you can remain undetected when surfing on specific sites. For this to work, you need the browser application Mozilla Firefox and a proxy IP address. A large list of proxy sites can be found here.
Go to “Options” in your Mozilla Firefox browser and select “Advanced”. Under “Connections” select “Settings”. Now go to “Manual Proxy Settings” and enter the obtained Proxy IP, Port 8080 in the field next to it and save the settings. This way your browser application will browse with this proxy IP address. You can select and enter a different proxy if you find that it does not work.
Use ‘Hola Browser Extension’ to get around Blocked Sites
If you want to get to blocked websites like the BBC iPlayer or Hulu, the Hola browser extension can help you. Hola is a fast, free and easy-to-use proxy that works by routing your browser traffic through the Internet networks of other Hola users (like TOR). In return, some of the traffic from other similar Hola users will be routed through your computer, just like a peer-to-peer network (which is why the service is provided free of charge).
It is possible to route your computer traffic through any country that hosts Hola users, which includes several (if not most) nations of the world. A big disadvantage of this extension is that it’s only available for Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome – so if you’re using Opera or Safari, you’ll have to use another alternative method to share blocked websites.
Use ‘Translation Services’ to get around Blocked Sites
If the above options have not been successful, you can try bypassing web filters by using a translation service such as Bing Translation or Google Translation. When you translate your link from another language into English, it is sometimes possible to get to blocked websites. On the other hand, you can use a URL shortening service like “TinyURL“.
‘Change DNS Servers’ to get around Blocked Websites
A popular method for blocking websites is to prevent DNS servers from providing the locations of the servers of the blocked website. In such a case, switching your DNS servers to Google’s DNS or OpenDNS is the best choice to bypass the blocked websites. As an added benefit, this will even increase your Internet speed.
