How To Unblock Websites At School
With time, schools have adopted technological advancements, and the ability to block websites has come with it. The major reason of blocking websites in school is to keep their computers and data safe from cyber threats. Sometimes, websites are blocked to keep students from getting distracted from studying. It is also done to prevent users from opening illegal and unsafe websites.
For these reasons, schools have to use filters and firewalls on the network to block certain websites. Actually, the network administrator blocks specific ports to block online traffic. It may also be done by blacklisting specific websites either by IP address, domain name or both.
The types of websites a school usually blocks include gaming, torrent, obscene, music, social media and entertainment websites. Therefore, you are unlikely to open many popular websites on a school network. This includes Facebook, Wattpad, YouTube, Netflix, SoundCloud, Miniclip and many more.
However, in this technologically advanced era, there are many ways to bypass blocked websites at school. Read further to learn all the details on the most effective ways to unblock restricted sites at schools.
1. Using a Proxy Service
Whenever we talk about unblocking a blocked website, the word "proxy" comes to mind, but what is a proxy? A proxy is just a server that acts as a bridge between the internet and your device. A proxy works when the user sends connection requests to it. Then, the proxy either shows the content you have asked to see or checks its local cache. The cache is checked in order for the proxy to know it can show the desired content without forwarding the request to the internet.
A proxy is quite an efficient tool if you're using it to unblock sites. This is because it also masks your IP address while you're accessing your favorite websites at school. Since your IP address is hidden, you can easily get around firewalls on the network.
That being said, proxies are often pretty overcrowded, so it is natural for them to be slow usually. In addition to that, using proxies to unblock sites is a famous method. So you shouldn't be surprised if your school network has blocked access to proxy websites.
2. Using a VPN Service
A VPN (Virtual Private Network) is a service that, like a proxy, hides your true IP address. However, it adds another protective layer on your online activities by encrypting your connections. With a service that changes your IP address every time you connect to its server, bypassing a network firewall becomes really easy.
Not only that, a VPN can lend you IP addresses of different regions. This is particularly helpful for users to get around regional restrictions as well.
Also, a good VPN service provides clients that can cross between platforms. Therefore, you can carry the installation files of your VPN in your pen-drive and easily install it on a school computer. You wouldn't have to download your VPN again at school, which could be tough in the presence of filters.
3. Using HTTPS
In schools, network administrators usually block websites on only the port 80 of HTTP. This means that they leave the port 443 of HTTPS unblocked and open. This gives students a chance to use HTTPS to access their favorite websites even if they're blocked.
In order to do that, they just have to type "s" after "http" in the website URL. For instance, if you wish to open Youtube, simply use the "https://youtube.com" URL instead of using the "http://youtube.com" URL. Basically, this makes the connection use the unblocked 443 HTTPS port.
Since you only need to add one letter in the URL, this is the simplest method in this list. However, an important thing to note about this method is that it only works for websites with safe connectivity.
4. Using the IP Address of the Website
Many times, network administrators of schools only use URLs to block websites, ignoring their IP addresses. If this is the case, the IP address of a blocked website can be used to access it. You only have to enter the IP address in the URL bar of your browser.
That being said, you need to know the IP address of the blocked website beforehand. You'd be happy to know that IP addresses of websites aren't difficult to find on the internet. For this, you just have to go to the Command Processor. In the prompt, you have to type "ping" followed by a single space and then type "www.websitename.com." For example, "ping www.google.com." After this, you must press Enter to get the IP address.
5. Using Portable Browsers
The term "Portable Browsers" is quite self explanatory; the term refers to browsers that you can carry around. To unblock websites at school using this method, you need a USB. On your USB, you have to install a portable browser.
With a portable browser, you can open your desired websites without getting a lot of interruption from the school computers and the school network. This particular method works well for blocked file transfers. An example of a portable browser is the Opera Portable.
An added benefit of portable browsers is that they can be combined with proxy to unblock websites. However, there's a catch to it. You have to know the proxy server addresses and relevant port numbers beforehand. For this, you can write them down in a notebook or on your phone. You will need this information to configure it on your portable browser at your school.
6. Set Up Browser Network Proxies
This method is effective if your school uses more than one proxy on its server. If this is the case, you can try and jump between those. This is done so that you can get access to the websites that your school has blocked.
In order to pull this off, you would only need to access the network options of your browser. Using those options, you would have to either disable the proxy or switch between the available proxies. It is possible that your desired website is blocked on one of the proxies only. In that case, this method would give you a chance to open that website on a different available proxy.
One important thing to remember is that there is a lot of uncertainty involved in this method. So it is natural that this method is not bound to work always.













