Is my ISP blocking websites?

submitted by [deleted] from self.Internet

My internet works fine for most websites, but some of them just won't connect. It'll timeout no matter what device or browser I'm using, saying the website "took too long to respond." Oddly, my internet speed is usually around 25Mbps (according to speedtest.net) and I can watch 1080p videos on YouTube without any loading — even while downloading a large file.

Even more odd is that I can access the websites just fine through TOR (which is notoriously slow), a VPN, or my phone's data. This happened all of the sudden about two weeks ago and I've factory-reset my modem a couple times to no avail, which means it's probably not an issue on my end.

I think my ISP is blocking these websites, though I'm not entirely sure. I've done tests for days (different devices, browsers, DNS servers, flushing the DNS, clearing cache, turning off the firewall, etc.) but still can't say for certain. How can I be sure? Other than asking people with the same ISP, which I can't do because I don't know anyone. I don't know if I should list the ISP here over privacy concerns.

Also, what do I do if they are blocking websites? I can connect to them over TOR or a VPN, but I don't trust those with my passwords, and using my phone's data would result in it running out pretty fast. Is there anything I can really do, or do I just have to accept that certain websites are inaccessible to me now? I can't change ISPs because they have a monopoly here...

List of known problematic websites (subject to edit):

  • Neocities.org (which includes my own website)
  • Mega.nz
  • Quad9.net (the website for a DNS server I tested, I had to access it on my phone)
  • Rt.com (I don't really care because it's Russian propaganda, but I noticed it was down)
  • Libreoffice.org
  • Torproject.org (I just used a mirror, joke's on you)
  • brandnewtube.com
  • projectveritas.com

I don't notice a trend with these websites, but if anyone does, comment down below.

This is all weird to me. I don't really know what to think because I haven't been in this situation before. I thought that, living in the United States, I would never have to deal with this. Thanks for reading, and if you have any advice to give, please do so. Feel free to list out tests I can do, troubleshoots I can try — anything, really.

I hope I'm wrong, but I think my ISP is blocking websites.

UPDATE as of 25 Sep: u/HalJordan left a comment advising me to try to enter the IP addresses into my address bar directly and this was my response. In short I found out that by editing my hosts file I could connect to some of them (though not all) leading me to believe that my ISP is somehow preventing every DNS server I use from giving me the right address for certain websites.

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[–]HalJordan 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

I tried pinging all of those websites to see if I was blocked too (I'm not). Looking at the IP addresses gave me an idea. I loaded up https://89.238.68.168 which brought up the LibreOffice website. Maybe substituting IP addresses for domain names might help.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Opening that link did work, actually. It gave me a warning that the website wasn't secure, but I could, indeed, access it via the IP address. I did a test with this, using ping to retrieve the IP addresses of each problematic website and attempting to enter them.

Mega.nz (66.203.127.12) redirected me to the name address and returned the same error as usual. Neocities.org (198.51.233.100) returned 404, as did theameliamay.neocities.org (my website; 198.51.233.2). Quad9.net (216.21.3.77) gave me a privacy error, but allowed me through. Rt.com (207.244.80.166) redirected me to the name address and returned the same error as usual. Torproject.org (116.202.120.166) just sends me to a page titled "Welcome to web-fsn-02!" which isn't the usual website.

This gave me the idea to manually add the addresses to my hosts file (which is a bit dangerous), which worked perfectly for nearly every site — with the only exceptions being rt.com, torproject.org, and mega.nz.

I can connect to rt.com, but it doesn't load properly, while torproject.org returns the same error as usual. I assume this is for the same reason it didn't work properly when I attempted to make a direct connection. Mega.nz loads just fine but won't let me through the initial loading screen. I've removed the three problematic websites from my hosts file in order to not cause any issues, but left the rest.

I'm not sure why this is the case. You would assume my DNS server can't link the host names to the IP addresses, however, I've tested around 5 DNS servers by this point and none of them can get through, not even DNS.watch. Since I can connect to them via editing my hosts file I'm fairly certain there's not an IP block. Perhaps my ISP is somehow preventing every DNS server from providing my computer with the correct address?

Thanks a lot!

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

Try Tor browser and see if you can load the websites.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

I said in the post, twice, that I can access every one of the blocked websites through TOR.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Well, hell boy. Don't fault me for speed reading that post and missing all the key words!

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

It's not like I'm the best at reading walls of text either, lol.

[–]RavAshi 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Try use DNS-over-HTTPS.

(I suggest you to use Firefox and google "dns-over-https firefox" for how to set it in Firefox)

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Firefox doesn't get through. DNS-over-HTTPS is enabled by default and I tried testing different servers but none of them can get me through.

[–][deleted]  (5 children)

[deleted]

    [–][deleted] 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (4 children)

    It's just some robot telling you that they're "having problems" even when they're not (they just don't want to pay service reps and hope you'll go away lol) and to only continue if you have an "emergency". Not sure how well it would go over if I just continued anyways. Not sure if they'll even read an email but we could take that route.

    I was planning to contact them eventually, but I wanted to be sure first because they don't even know what they're doing, and being service reps will just read from a script the whole time. I need to be able to demonstrate that I've done literally everything that could be on their list, plus some.

    [–][deleted]  (3 children)

    [deleted]

      [–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

      They won't see it that way. Our ISP makes no guarantee of service. It's usually so if it goes down (like after a storm) they won't be held liable, but they often use this to screw people over. Our ISP has a monopoly so they can put whatever they want in the contract and we have to take it. Furthermore, with net neutrality gone it's entirely legal for them to choose what websites we can access and at what speeds.

      Even if it wasn't legal, we don't have the money to take them to court, and they have the money to bribe the court, so they could just give us the finger.

      [–]Comatoast 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

      Is it Comcast? If so, there's your answer.

      [–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

      No, it's not. Comcast doesn't provide service here.