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I have YouTube banned in my system. How can I enable it?

I tried to lookup for it in /etc/hosts.deny file but couldn't locate it.

Looking for an Ubuntu specific solution, how to disable/enable it? does modifying hosts.deny helps or not?

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7  
You want help to violate an office policy? Or what do you mean by "banned in my system"? – vasa1 Oct 12 '12 at 6:12
What happens when you try to access YouTube? – Eliah Kagan Oct 12 '12 at 6:19
former one @vasa.. :P – vipin8169 Oct 12 '12 at 6:22
it says:- Access to the requested web page has been blocked by NexTag internet usage protection policy. ACCESS BLOCKED – vipin8169 Oct 12 '12 at 6:23
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@vasa1 This is a legitimate question, even if you consider breaking rules universally illegitimate. 2 examples: An office might use automated software to block access to YouTube after discovering (or otherwise coming to believe) that most YouTube access violated existing policies (e.g., about work-relateness). Circumventing the automated policy doesn't entail breaking the rule it's designed to enforce. Or the rule may be for YouTube use during "company time" only. With that said, under many circumstances (especially where practical) it's advisable to consult/inform a supervisor or IT first. – Eliah Kagan Mar 4 at 8:27
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2 Answers

up vote 10 down vote
+50

I'm not sure that this is the right place to ask that question, since it's got nothing to do with Ubuntu (or any specific OS for that matter), BUT... Since it's already there, I might as well answer you :)

A note first: Before anyone thinks that it is 'not right' to try to circumvent a rule like this, there can actually exist a number of situations when there is no other way to access somethings that are otherwise completely legal and allowed and there's nothing wrong in doing so or trying to do so. I myself have had an awful opportunity to live in a place where so many convenient websites are blocked on a country level (I'm talking about Skype and Flickr and things like that, completely harmless). Also, rational people should not be approving any kind of restrictions, and grown-ups need to be responsible for their own actions.

Depending on the method used to block the content, there might be one or more methods (or none :) ) that you can use. The first thing that I'd suggest is trying to use a proxy server. You can do it in several ways. The best place to start would be Hide My Ass. There you can:

  • Use a web proxy: Just type an address in the Web Proxy field on the Hide My Ass homepage;
  • Find the List of ip:port proxy addresses that you can use in your browser. If you don't know how to use these addresses, please leave a comment here;

You can also find many useful instructions on that website.

A second solution is to use Tor project and its Vidalia tool. Basically, it's a shared connection tool. You have several options there too.

  • One, download and install Vidalia Bundle. It includes the proxy solution and a browser already set up to work with Tor network.
  • Or you can install Vidalia tool separately (I believe it's available from Ubuntu Software Centre) and then set up your browser to use a proxy server on your localhost address.

There is some great documentation on Vidalia's website, but if you're having trouble with it, feel free to leave a comment here.

Another possible solution that I just remembered might help you is to download and install Opera desktop browser. When you open Opera, enable its Opera Turbo feature. Opera Turbo is a traffic compression tool by Opera, but by nature it uses Opera's proxy servers. That might be handy.

Finally, also in Opera, you have a feature to browse internet in a 'Private tab'. I'm really not sure if that will help, but it's worth mentioning. I also have no idea if any other browser has this feature. To enable private browsing in Opera, click on Opera button > Tabs and Windows > New private tab, and browse away :)

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it says video not found for all of the videos in youtube – vipin8169 Oct 15 '12 at 8:19
for your 2nd comment, i searched for india>> hidemyass.com/proxy-list/search-225457 and then navigated to first result, 111.125.139.199 it is asking for admin login – vipin8169 Oct 15 '12 at 8:22
tried accessing yahoomail using this hidemyass and it said "ebable javascript in your browser" while it was already enabled – vipin8169 Oct 15 '12 at 9:17
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It is actually quite cumbersome to find a long-term working ip:port proxy server. But if you keep trying, you will succeed eventually. Indian proxies are not the best idea. Try using Russian ones, I've had some luck with them. Also, while searching, include only fast speed fast connection, high and high+ka anonymity, and sort results by date tested. That can help you a bit. I'm not sure why web proxy isn't working on hidemyass.com but as I mentioned, that can be only your start. There are tons of them around the net. I'm also gonna include in my answer another solution. – Томица Кораћ Oct 15 '12 at 14:42
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Make some friends in your IT department. They will eventually give you access to the mighty you-can-do-anything-proxy :-) – cauon Oct 15 '12 at 15:21
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up vote 0 down vote accepted

used https instead of http and I was able to open the youtube :)

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i was able to open the youtube videos using https but when i executed the command wget https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StJLvbPIvTw in Terminal it gave the following response:- --2013-03-04 13:09:28-- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StJLvbPIvTw Resolving www.youtube.com (www.youtube.com)... 74.125.236.167, 74.125.236.160, 74.125.236.164, ... Connecting to www.youtube.com (www.youtube.com)|74.125.236.167|:443... connected. Unable to establish SSL connection. – vipin8169 Mar 4 at 7:42
Can i wget YouTube videos or not at all?? How can I download the YouTube videos in this scenario? – vipin8169 Mar 4 at 7:44
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I recommend posting a separate question to ask how to download YouTube videos via HTTPS. – Eliah Kagan Mar 4 at 8:19
ok.. i was afraid of downvoting. That's why i didn't ask a separate question – vipin8169 Mar 4 at 8:31

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