4 ms·

Does this bill also block all corporate VPNs? How would that work?

lupusreal 1y ago
The way that would work is probably the legislators hastily adding an exemption for corporations once the corporate lobbyists ask them for it. I doubt any of this will go anywhere though, it's mostly just pandering to local christians and for them the nominal attempt counts nearly as much as actually getting it done.
taylodl 1y ago
No WFH in Michigan!
yorwba 1y ago
The bill specifically addresses circumvention tools "designed to bypass internet filtering mechanisms or content restrictions," so unless your corporate VPN is designed to do that (as opposed to granting remote access to the company network) I don't think it would be covered.
- wrs 1y ago
  All VPNs do the same thing: give remote access to another network. Plenty of companies use full tunnels so access to the general internet goes through the company network. That happens to bypass content restrictions using exactly the same mechanism. Is it “designed” to do it?
  - Bender 1y ago
    FWIW some corporations do configure their VPN in a split tunnel config so that things like Youtube do not traverse the VPN and so that pizza delivery remains local. They instead have inclusive lists of domains and IP's that will traverse the VPN. Either way I think its a moot point. If the bill could include corporations they would band together and kill the bill along with having the politician censured or expelled. Corporations have a lot of influence, lawyers and money. Threaten their money and they make things happen. Not much if any critical thinking went into this proposal. It's likely just a virtue-signal to win favor.
    - wrs 1y ago
      Absolutely. It’s a sore point for me because I spent a couple of years with all the traffic from my computer in Seattle being routed through Bentonville. :) The tradeoff is split tunnel setups usually mean you also need an endpoint firewall and/or DLP installed on your laptop. Anyway, yeah, I was responding to the comment, not the politicians. We can only hope it’s a moot point.
billy99k 1y ago
My guess is they will get IP lists from all major VPN providers and block them at the ISP level.

The way that would work is probably the legislators hastily adding an exemption for corporations once the corporate lobbyists ask them for it. I doubt any of this will go anywhere though, it's mostly just pandering to local christians and for them the nominal attempt counts nearly as much as actually getting it done.

taylodl 1y ago

No WFH in Michigan!

yorwba 1y ago

The bill specifically addresses circumvention tools "designed to bypass internet filtering mechanisms or content restrictions," so unless your corporate VPN is designed to do that (as opposed to granting remote access to the company network) I don't think it would be covered.

wrs 1y ago
All VPNs do the same thing: give remote access to another network. Plenty of companies use full tunnels so access to the general internet goes through the company network. That happens to bypass content restrictions using exactly the same mechanism. Is it “designed” to do it?
- Bender 1y ago
  FWIW some corporations do configure their VPN in a split tunnel config so that things like Youtube do not traverse the VPN and so that pizza delivery remains local. They instead have inclusive lists of domains and IP's that will traverse the VPN. Either way I think its a moot point. If the bill could include corporations they would band together and kill the bill along with having the politician censured or expelled. Corporations have a lot of influence, lawyers and money. Threaten their money and they make things happen. Not much if any critical thinking went into this proposal. It's likely just a virtue-signal to win favor.
  - wrs 1y ago
    Absolutely. It’s a sore point for me because I spent a couple of years with all the traffic from my computer in Seattle being routed through Bentonville. :) The tradeoff is split tunnel setups usually mean you also need an endpoint firewall and/or DLP installed on your laptop. Anyway, yeah, I was responding to the comment, not the politicians. We can only hope it’s a moot point.

billy99k 1y ago

My guess is they will get IP lists from all major VPN providers and block them at the ISP level.