Hello jsp Administration,

I am writing to request a review of the current policy that prevents users from posting while using a VPN.

While I understand the security reasons behind this policy, VPN usage has become a functional requirement for many users globally.
This is particularly true for those in the United Kingdom following the Online Safety Act 2023, but it also affects users in regions like Turkey, Indonesia, and Australia where certain media-hosting sites are restricted.

The Context:

- Imgur Geo-Blocking: Since late 2025, Imgur has withdrawn from the UK market. It is also blocked at a government level in at least one other country (Turkey).

- Impact on jsp: For users in these regions, images hosted on Imgur—including those embedded in jsp forum threads—appear as broken links or "Content Unavailable" errors.

- Currently, these users will need to toggle a VPN to view the images/content (if using imgur) of a thread, and then toggle it back off if they wish to reply.

I would appreciate it if the admin team could discuss this policy. As digital regulations change, allowing VPN access for verified would create a much more seamless experience for your international community.

Thanks for your time and for reading.

FAQ

What is the issue / why is this a problem.

Well - when browsing jsp without a vpn this is often how it looks to anyone in the UK (and at least one other country)





To see this image ^ I must have a VPN on.

Q: Why not just use a different image host?
A: While I can control where I upload, I cannot control where other traders upload. Imgur is the most popular image repo for this site.

Q: Won't allowing VPNs lead to more scammers or ban-evaders?
A: This is a valid concern, and why I have asked for a discussion rather than any one solution/implementation

Q: Is it really that much effort to toggle a VPN off to post?
It is a significant frustration. Just posting this for example - I clicked post - VPN warning came on - I turned my VPN off. And then re-wrote the post.

This post was edited by balkothsmush on Mar 14 2026 05:17am

Never gonna happen.
If you can't see the image, simply pm the seller and ask for the stats -- or ask them politely to upload it with an engine that you can see.

Thank you for the quick reply.
The issue is more than just not being able to see the images as I outlined above. I can quickly see the images by turning off the VPN

Am I right in sensing that consistency and site security are the primary priorities here, and there's a concern that changing this policy might compromise those?

Allowing a VPN makes it so any scammer/multi can continuously create new accounts and scam even easier.
It will never happen lol.

fun fact: you can already use VPN that won't look any different than home connection, and site won't know its VPN. And they can and do use vpn for scams. The rule is dead weight that only affects legitimate users



There is one way to fix this, have VPN that has whitelist, so that some sites (in this case jsp) will go directly, and others (imgur) will go through VPN.

This post was edited by xmr on Mar 14 2026 06:08am

Great way to dry snitch on yourself and others.
Even if rules are dead weight in your mind doesnt mean they are in the admins mind.
Rules are rules, VPNs are not allowed here.
Hopefully they take a more active stance on this since you have mentioned that some do infact work here.

Of course they work, there is nothing magical about VPNs and there is no difference from server perspective if someone is using one of not. Of course admins may have entire IP ranges of known VPN providers coded in, as well as tor exit nodes, but everything else is transparent. And they can't do anything about this, they can't do a more active stance even if they wanted to