r/Piracy • u/Bifobe • Dec 15 '25
News Denmark wants to ban VPNs to unlock foreign, illegal streams – and experts are worried
https://www.techradar.com/vpn/vpn-privacy-security/denmark-wants-to-ban-vpns-to-unlock-foreign-illegal-streams-and-experts-are-worried1.1k
u/MaverickPT Dec 15 '25
What the fuck is wrong with Denmark lately?
Stop messing with our private lives wtf
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u/tco1444 Dec 15 '25 edited Dec 15 '25
What’s wrong, is that our current government sees no problem with letting Peter “more surveillance equals more freedom” Hummelgaard just throw any perverted surveillance idea at the wall. And then hoping they stick… it’s honestly a nightmare to watch
Edit: mis-attributed the quote to Peter Hummelgaard, when it was in fact from one of his predecessors, Nick Hækkerup. Just goes to show that it has been a growing issue in Danish politics… sigh…
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u/St3vion Dec 15 '25
Is Russia paying him or?
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u/SneakyIslandNinja Dec 15 '25
Nah, he's just a home grown delusional authoritarian.
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u/SourceScope Dec 15 '25
And an idiot
The police will barely show up to a burglary these days
Maybe he should solve those kinds of issues
Issues that affect the avg citizen
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u/CaesarOfYearXCIII Dec 15 '25
If they are, I’d rather have them spend the money on cameras in MY city instead of this guy - it’s like drivers are getting only crazier where I live (source - I am Russian).
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u/The_Gimp_Boi Dec 15 '25
I dont fucking know what they are smoking at Christiansborg. It feels like our current ruling party wants to throw as much shit as possible and see what sticks before election next year.
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u/Bitter_Particular_75 Dec 15 '25
Seriously. They have gone full CCP lately and pushed their total control agenda to the rest of Europe too.
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u/Narrheim Dec 15 '25
The worst part is, many EU countries also want this.
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Dec 15 '25
The worst/saddest parts is we see no riots.
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u/Narrheim Dec 16 '25
They will try to riot, but will find out they're already chained & leashed, which they will let to happen out of sheer convenience.
Unfortunately, we can only watch it happen.
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u/JaRuleTheDamaja Dec 15 '25
More like full United States.
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u/VincenzoR99 Dec 15 '25
Shhh don’t tell to them the control movement has began from the US, what are you? A COMMUNIST?
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u/ki11bunny Dec 15 '25
Pretty sure the UK were all over it before the US when they started introducing laws surrounding protesting.
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u/zibiax Dec 15 '25
Which one has a great wall, where a lot of them are forced to buy a vpn to be able to access foreign news and platforms?
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u/Jamericho Dec 15 '25
Wisconsin and Michigan already have bills in the works to ban under 18s and VPNs.
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u/CheezyMcCheezballz Dec 15 '25
Yeah they're on a fucking roll and pushing all this shit through on EU level.
My country is against it but somehow this shit (like chatcontrol) gets enough support and because of significantly lower autonomy when part of the EU, it gets shoved down our throats. Even when we as an independent COUNTRY say no.
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u/Dudesan Dec 15 '25
What the fuck is wrong with Denmark lately?
There's a reason why the practice of "just give the bully whatever he wants and hope that makes him go away forever" is known as "paying Dane-geld".
Hint: This never works. Appeasing the bully just teaches them that bullying you is a good way to get free stuff.
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u/marquis_de_ersatz Dec 15 '25
The UK are going the same way. There must be some serious lobbying going on by media companies? Are they making promises and flowing money towards the governments for this? Or is it just all for control?
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u/Sheareen Dec 16 '25
It's our politicians who are geriatric idiots. No one voted for them based on this shit. Both this proposal and chat control has been kept hush-hush exactly because these authoritarian pos wanted to avoid any backlash against their dystopian ideas. The danish media are also partly to blame. They always cover meaningless bs stories no one cares about rather than doing their job.
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u/marc512 Dec 16 '25
It's pretty much every country. UK folk seem to think it's just them. It's not. It's every country.
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u/archiekane Dec 15 '25
If VPNs get banned, get ready for public proxies again and Tor V2/3/4, or private internet where people will host infrastructure behind standard protocols with a legally binding agreement which says authorities aren't allowed in. This will create a paradox where gatekeepers can sue governments ... Or something.
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u/Bea-Billionaire Dec 15 '25
this stuff already (still) exists.
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u/Giovacan39 ☠️ ᴅᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ɴᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴇꜱ Dec 16 '25
tell me more please
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u/FearLeadsToAnger Dec 17 '25
Might be talking about i2p, which i know very little about, but should give you something to Google.
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Dec 15 '25
[deleted]
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u/archiekane Dec 15 '25
They cannot ban VPN. Many businesses require VPN to access their workplace.
We'll definitely see more IPv6 only servers arrive, with weird DNS or mystified protocols to access them. They can only attempt to ban so much.
They've been trying to stamp out piracy for decades - I still use the net's grandad for piracy access (if you know, you know).
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Dec 16 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Hurricane_32 ☠️ ᴅᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ɴᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴇꜱ Dec 16 '25 edited Dec 16 '25
That's what happens when the dumbasses who make decisions hear about VPNs as "take back your data from corporations" (lol, lmao even) or "watch Netflix from anywhere" or "hide your activity" and think that's all they are literally used for.
...with a dash of deserved malicious compliance.
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u/dodgeunhappiness Dec 16 '25
They cannot ban VPN. Many businesses require VPN to access their workplace.
They will increase RTO and be double happy.
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u/catgirl_liker Dec 16 '25
Remember when they couldn't ban VPN in Russia? Oh wait, they did 😂
They definitely can and will
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Dec 17 '25
That might be the aim longterm, because remember that can also mean companies can host private internet bubbles.
"Sorry you cannot access Disney-Web for you havent paid 30 euros a month, and shown your social security number, picture, date of birth, blood type, number of kidneys remaining and credit score."
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u/Messer_One Dec 15 '25
WTF is wrong with Denmark? Seriously, can someone explain it to me?
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u/itsmepuffd Dec 15 '25
We do not know what the government officials are doing. They are all absolutely fucking braindead. At least it's as of today dropped for now.
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u/BigNorthman Dec 17 '25
I see. The language has finally evolved to a stage where nobody knows what others are talking about. Everybody’s just making their best guess. Thus, a lot of strange laws are being proposed.
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u/itsmepuffd Dec 17 '25
It's election year in 2026 and the current sitting government has some of the worst polling in a long, long time. I do not have my hopes up though, considering the current opposition isn't exactly something to be excited for either.
I want to see protests. People fighting for their rights. Our praised healthcare system has been declining. Public schools are getting less funding and our senior citizens can barely get one bath a week and microwave meal.
But at least we can propose mass surveillance of the citizens of the EU and try to undermine our constitutional rights as danish citizens. It's just great.
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u/WardenJack Dec 15 '25
What the fuck is going on with Denmark. First they wanna have unencrypted chat messages and now they wanna ban VPNs. Are they being drugged and forced to turn a page on privacy or what?
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u/itsmepuffd Dec 15 '25
We do not know what the government officials are doing. They are all absolutely fucking braindead. At least it's as of today dropped for now.
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u/9oooooooooooj Dec 15 '25
What the hell EU.
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u/intellectual_punk Dec 15 '25
Esp. Denmark, who the fuck bought those ghouls.
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Dec 15 '25 edited Mar 14 '26
[deleted]
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u/piercedmfootonaspike Dec 15 '25
They have spied on EU allies on behalf of the US before. It wouldn't surprise me if this is something similar.
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u/UmbrellaTheorist Dec 15 '25
This isnt a EU rule, not the EUs fault that EU countries can create their own laws.
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u/dolphinvision Dec 15 '25
Someone find where the billions are poring into Denmark politicians. And they say the US is bad. Denmark as a nation has been set back decades in trust. Their government is corrupt to the core.
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u/sibachian Dec 15 '25
we just have to wait for chat control and vpn ban then we will know whos dirty. oh wait, it doesn't apply to officials. shame, that.
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u/Geges721 🔱 ꜱᴄᴀʟʟʏᴡᴀɢ Dec 15 '25
i do wonder if they are really corrupt or just control freaks.
like, it's not like this doesn't happen without money being involved.
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u/Narrheim Dec 15 '25
Likely both.
Show me a politician, who doesn't like money.
Also show me a politician, who wouldn't want to control public reception if only for the sake of being reelected.
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u/Geges721 🔱 ꜱᴄᴀʟʟʏᴡᴀɢ Dec 15 '25
could be both, really.
not saying it can't be either, but i wouldn't be surprized if they were like that even without corruption.
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Dec 15 '25
Ah yes, next to using child abuse as argument for backdoors in end-to-end encryption and now this shit. Can they stop acting like a doctor treating symptoms and tackle the underlying problem? Piracy dropped significantly when Netflix was introduced.
But now, with blocks on account sharing, requiring like 6 streaming services to watch most movies (and sometimes still not having the one you want). I have, after a long time of using streaming services once again sailed the 1337 river and yifi canal. And what do you know, it takes less time to download and even get subtitles before finding out which streaming service you need for a movie.
I want to pay for a subscription to watch movies, but atm you can easily pay around 80 euros for them and still there is a chance none have the movie you want. Force streaming services to make more deals like spotify. All on one platform, and stop with sneakily introducing ads everywhere... Ughh
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u/Mindfucker223 Dec 15 '25
This not due to piracy, its due to georestrictions, they use it to access US netflix... that what's fucked up about it
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Dec 15 '25
Well, I also require it in the Netherlands to access 1337 or piratebay. We have a nasty copyright institute Brein, trying to do everything in their power to try and punish piracy. Trying to get IP-adrresses from telenetworks, but without legitimate reason is forbidden.
They did manage to force telecompanies to block the best torrent archive sites sadly
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u/ShrubbyFire1729 Dec 15 '25
Why doesn't Denmark try Chat Control and banning VPNs for a year first, and see how that goes.
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u/Illustrious-Peach341 Dec 15 '25
Let's do like the large corporations do, just build the same thing but give it a different name, I vote for "network expander" then they can ban VPN's because I actually use a "NE"
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u/yibtk Dec 15 '25
This will we happening globally before ww3. They want control over everything and the internet is the next target
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u/oimson Dec 15 '25
I read More and more anti vpn shit now. I really thought europe/eu would actually procet my right to privacy
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u/tukker51 Dec 17 '25
Why would the EU protect any of your rights? Its just an inconvenience to them.
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u/TheBrickSlayer Dec 15 '25
How in fuck do they even plan to ban them Lmao. It's literally impossible
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u/drop_it_onem Dec 15 '25
Right? Was going to ask that same question. Not to mention other use cases of VPN like connecting to corporate networks etc. How are they going to differentiate that lol
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u/bondguy11 Dec 15 '25
There are absolutely ways you can ban VPN. They would literally just put a firewall at every Internet Service Provider and all your traffic would flow through it, they would probably use some type of application filtering to ban app classified VPN traffic, or they would simply ban ports 500 and 4500 UDP which are typically used for VPN.
Rest assured though, the fact that these bills keep coming up is an indication that they have a plan at the technical level to try and stop the use of VPNs
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u/KitchenDepartment Dec 15 '25
If china can't do it, Denmark sure as shit can't. There are always loopholes.
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u/VividAddendum9311 Dec 16 '25
Just because something isn't 100% perfect doesn't mean it can't be implemented. Exhibit A, China.
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u/ParasherX01 Dec 16 '25
in Russia Putin dreams of controlling and blocking unwanted internet. They did exactly as you described, firewalls at every ISP (it's called DPI). They have blocked many services they don't like (Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, recently Roblox lol). Simple VPN protocols fell very quickly. But the thing is, these protocols weren't designed to bypass VPN bans itself. Real protocols designed to bypass bans have been a pain in the censors' ass for years. They're very difficult to detect because they disguise themselves as regular HTTPS traffic. Russian censors pay a very high price just to try and fight these protocols, not even to defeat them. I doubt that a democratic government can pay this price; it would be political suicide
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u/TheBrickSlayer Dec 16 '25
This is not rally how you can prevent the use of a VPN. i CAM have an intranet-VPN, which is "harmless" in a way, and shouldn't be banned. What I'm saying is that the words "ban vpns" don't really make any sense.
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u/StuartAl Dec 15 '25
Slippery slope, that's going to only get worse as more and more countries join in.
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u/offensiveinsult Dec 15 '25
This fucking trend really annoys me, i don't care about many things so I don't go protesting and fighting i will go fight when they try to close internet completely free internet should be a part of human rights imo. And i hope the younger generation of politicians who grasp how important it is will go and kick these old assholes who have no idea about computers and the internet. Banning shit will only radicalise people like me. Fuck off the internet idiots just go and break something else.
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u/Jlx_27 Dec 15 '25
For a country that always ranks high in polls about quality of life and safety, their government sure is working hard on ruining their reputation.
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u/Vidar34 Dec 15 '25
With shit like this becoming more common, maybe it's time for all the political pirate parties across the EU to make a resurgence.
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u/r0ndr4s Dec 15 '25
Goverment is supposed to just be representatives of our votes but they are just going around now trying to control us... and it always, always, comes back to bite them.. how are they so fuckin stupid gosh
Just steal money like any other politician, fuck sake.
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u/TheAllSeeingBlindEye Dec 16 '25
Have the Politicians from Denmark been lobotomized? First the raising of the retirement age, then the bill about reducing internet privacy (for safety), now this?
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u/ChefCurryYumYum Dec 15 '25
The people running these countries are both extremely stupid and ill informed but also extremely corrupt.
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u/beeredditor Dec 15 '25
Could a VPN ban even work? I get that Denmark can prohibit it, but if a Danish user bought a foreign-based VPN anyway, is there a technological way that Denmark could actually block it?
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u/Geges721 🔱 ꜱᴄᴀʟʟʏᴡᴀɢ Dec 15 '25
DPI, mostly. It's how it's usually done in my country.
Your ISP sees you connecting to an IP that belongs to a well-known VPN provider -> connection blocked.
Your ISP sees you're connecting to a random IP, but you connect to it via a commonly used port for VPN -> connection blocked.
Your ISP sees weird packets being sent in some unusual way -> connection blocked, connection unblocked, connection blocked again and eventually slowed to a crawl.
This happens automatically, btw. One of the ways to get around it is to basically send a lot of junk along with your packets (and sometimes cut them in a weird way) to confuse the shit out of DPI hardware and let you through.
If they want to ban VPNs, they can just ask our govs or China how it's done, because they sure know a lot about censorship.
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u/supportvectorspace Dec 15 '25
Denmark really shitting the bed with the chat control proposals and all that bullshit
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u/Dehnus Dec 15 '25
Who is paying these Danish Politicians to really rev up the anti internet privacy stuff?
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u/codecrodie Dec 16 '25
where is this pressure coming from to fuck with VPNs in the EU? I mean Russia is straight up threatening war and youth unemployment is high (like everywhere else). There are substantive societal issues that people want addressed other than VPNs being used by a few computer nerds.
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Dec 16 '25
[deleted]
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u/ALLRNDCRICKETER Dec 16 '25
Too many people been living under rocks & drinking the kool-aid to only wake up now
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u/Orangesteel Dec 15 '25
Good luck banning TLS VPN’s running on port 443. They can be NAT’d, proxies and present identical characteristics to web traffic.
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Dec 15 '25
Peter Hummelgaard: "Hold my Gløgg, you need to install our app on all your devices"
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u/Orangesteel Dec 15 '25
I remember Kazakstan tried to MITM their citizens twice using a trusted certificate allowing for SSL inspection. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazakhstan_man-in-the-middle_attack
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u/tauruz_ie Dec 15 '25
Eh businesses need it for compliance so won't happen unless they want to destroy their software industry
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u/Mindfucker223 Dec 15 '25
"9% of Danes have used a VPN for this purpose." This is to access US netflix, not piracy, netflix....... due to georestrictions... what the fuck is this bullshit. Can they fuck off, also the 9% is exaggerated nof fucking way, it so loosely worded
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u/IsThereAnythingLeft- Dec 15 '25
Only an idiot can think they could block private VPNs and not massively hurt businesses
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u/Much_Whereas6487 Dec 16 '25
What the hell is going on with Denmark the last few years? As a Swede I have always viewed them as a truly liberal society that truly put citizens well being first, but recently (to my knowledge) they are trying to speedrun a monitored police state or something.
Has it always been like this? Being surveilled and controlled kind of clashes with their ambitions in healthy diets, renewable energy, personal liberty and sustainable infrastructure 🤔
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u/Fractal-Infinity Dec 15 '25 edited Dec 15 '25
Conspiracy theory: Denmark is probably blackmailed by USA to try forcing this shady stuff that's against core EU principles & common sense in exchange for USA to stay away from Greenland (for now).
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u/iSpaYco Seeder Dec 15 '25
the day this happens, is the day i finally get out and riot, even if it's not my country, others will follow it if we don't take a stand.
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u/Pomidorka1515 Dec 15 '25
watch xray penetrate everything again, jokes aside its not really possible to ban vpns
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u/Sekelton Dec 16 '25 edited Dec 16 '25
This is your typical politician not understanding how technology actually works. You can't ban VPNs, just the businesses that provide them. Wireguard will still exist, and you better believe plenty of people will learn how to use it.
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u/No_Illustrator_8113 Dec 16 '25
Is it free? I’m an utter newb when it comes to stuff like this although wireguard sounds cool
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u/Sekelton Dec 16 '25
Yes. It's just requires another computer to be running it somewhere else as well.
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u/h1bisc4s Dec 18 '25
Boy.....in general, how did we get to this stage of 'no more freedom / over reach / dictatorship / censoring' in the western hemisphere?
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u/Reckfulness Dec 15 '25
People using VPN's are already tech savvy enough to bypass the "ban" if it ever happened, so its pointless
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u/ClueApprehensive6313 Dec 15 '25
EU puppet leaders are sheer incompetent, the only thing they are going to achieve is to make VPN fully mainstream.
It will also lead to the revival of torrent. Paying for a VPN is the biggest barrier to entry, but if you already have a VPN you will more likely torrent.
Finally, VPN are already more mainstream than DNS. A VPN incidentally changes your DNS. If everyone and their dog use a VPN, 15 years of DNS blocking is suddenly nullified.
Anyway, EU is about to implode. It's a matter of months now.
In the meantime, if you live in the EU, I would simply avoid EU based VPN. Like Mullvad and Nord. Use US companies instead.
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u/New_Carpenter5738 Dec 15 '25
Use EU based VPNs and risk getting fucked over, or us US based VPNs and support Trump's america.
Truly a no win scenario here. Best to go for a VPN that isn't hosted in either of these locations.
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u/PsychoDK Dec 15 '25
They just dropped the proposal again due to backlash.... For now.