Sky Broadband Issues & workaround

[daisyprincess]

Sorry I don't have a name, I just called Sky Technical Support, and I asked not to be fobbed off about technical difficulties, I want the facts.

I can only say what I was told..they said that ProBoards host more websites connected to file sharing.

I couldn't tell you if this is true or not..I haven't a clue who ProBoards customer base is, all I know is Sky has blocked a lot of these sites..Rapidshare/Megaupload etc...

[}} C L A R E M A R I E]

Hmm. I'm wondering, can ProBoards sue? I mean, the main creater. I'm not saying to do it, but... You're losing revenue, right? Because you go off the advertisements for fees and such? Well, the amount of sky users whom are unable to access your sites, the ads hit counter won't go up, and you lose money. Unless you don't work this way? I'm not too sure... never really paid attention to the advertisements.

I'm not actually allowed to phone sky, as my parents know I'll end up shouting at them cuz I'm pretty hotheaded, but, I'm gonna try my damn hardest to get around this just to mock them.

A few people have suggested UltraSurf to me, not sure if that actually means anything to you either? It doesn't to me ¬.¬

Anyway, I wanna say, thank you for actually giving a damn and trying to fix this. Most support places - eg. Sky - really don't care about their customers, and don't bother trying to fix things until they HAVE to.. :/

<33 much love.

[charliefarley]

Omg this is ridiculous!
So... they wont let me into proboards, but I can still access limewire and imesh???
No... they cant do that!


>>>>>>>

Ok I am modify my post, because I just called sky, a few minutes ago, here is what they told me....

Its not them, and its not proboards (quoting here) its.....

wait for it....."translatlantic communications and IP addressing issues"

And he said ISP's all around the UK are experiencing the same problems, he said "all ISP's", so I told him, the only ones I know who can't get into proboards are sky users...

He said they are working on it but can't garuntee a fix at this time, and it does seem to be connected to the file sharing sites being blocked. He said he is aware that proboards is not a file sharing site, but its all getting confused when people are connecting and the system is thinking that it needs to block us... not sky.. the system...

I am halfway computer literate, but most of what he said went totally over my head

So basically, what he told me
its not proboards
its not sky
its being looked into
and will hopefully be fixed at some time

He also informed me of the :8080 fix, and assured me they wont be blocked that until its all fixed....

How does that sound?
The trouble is now in England, Sky are like Tesco's they are taking over... its not easy to just change ISP when you have sky telly, sky talk, sky broadband all in one package

[johnnysbabe]

What a load of cr*p they do talk!
They should at least get their story straight.
From what the latest postings show here - it most certainly IS them and it most certainly IS intentional and it IS restricted to SKY subscribers accessing Proboards.

I spoke to a forum pal today who isn't with SKY and she and many others are having NO problems accessing the site at all.

They've virtually got a bl**dy monopoly in the UK anyway - so why the need for the underhand tactics?

Thanks for all the postings and info, guys, otherwise I would have been tearing my hair out!

[bazza1972]

Hi

Could anyone please tell me if this problem is effecting others apart from Sky users.

I'm only asking due to an E-mail from one of my Members from the Forum, stating he also can't login and he's on Tiscali.

Here's a copy of what he's told me.

---

yeah i enter my password and details and all i get is a blank screen. cant view posts or make posts.
I'm not on sky I'm on tiscali. i have no problems with any other website. thanks mate

---

Any help would be much appreciated.

Many thanks.

[bgraf]

I'm not on Sky and have been unable to access any of the Proboards I visit. This has happened periodically all week but specifically unable to gain any access all weekend. (Not even via my phone which isn't even using an internet subscription)
It only applies to accessing Proboards (accept this board- which seems to work fine) so i don't see how the problem can be specifically related to Sky??

[Dave L]

Those of you who say you are not on Sky, I think you need to say who you are on, if you want to help.

I analysed all the visitors to my forum yesterday and checked all the IP addresses. All the major ISPs seemed to be there, but none in the IP range allocated to Easynet/Sky.

I looked up the penetration stats for UK broadband suppliers, Sky/Easynet had 14% last year so they are far from having a monopoly on that so they are vulnerable to competition and will want to sort out this mess before the word spreads too far and wide.

[SpiderMike™]

Mar 21, 2010 11:35:37 GMT -8 daisyprincess said:

Sorry I don't have a name, I just called Sky Technical Support, and I asked not to be fobbed off about technical difficulties, I want the facts.

I can only say what I was told..they said that ProBoards host more websites connected to file sharing.

I couldn't tell you if this is true or not..I haven't a clue who ProBoards customer base is, all I know is Sky has blocked a lot of these sites..Rapidshare/Megaupload etc...

I can still access pretty much every filesharing site known to man, and I know some pretty backwater places so I gave them a call this afternoon quoting the above post as well as a previous post where they claim responsibility for blocking proboards and they deny the whole thing.

I was put through to a team leader and I explained the situation:- proboards is a provider of forums and they have strict policies in the ToS regarding file sharing and all known forums that operate sharing of links, files, torrents are disabled and removed.

The guy I spoke with was adamant that it's not in Sky's practice to block forum providers and their sole aim is to simply deter their customer base from accessing file sharing sites such as megaupload, hotfile etc etc.

I gave him various URL's for PB sites and he must have had access as he confirmed each one for what they were and he was literally stumped. He mentioned logs, complaints and issues regarding repeat reports from PB users but none of them are linked to file sharing and his last statement used the brilliant word 'categorically' where he basically promised that whatever the error it is merely that. An error, and apparently has no link to file sharing what so ever.

He also reasoned with me, saying that if PB was the victim of a ban then they would also have to go for search engines as they provide bigger links to file sharing sites than any one forum could.

So from his sincerity I don't really have any reason to doubt that this isn't a malicious act. Sky are incompetent when it comes to customer service but I've never had a problem with upper management. So whoever mentioned PB being banned as a result of file sharing is either misinformed or scaremongering.

[Martyn Dale]

I actually have a reference number with their upstream provider for the issue. Unfortunately they dont work weekends so im needing to wait to talk to them about it.

All i got from sky is that they know its an issue at their end (either them or their upstream provider) but they have no information as to whether it was an intentional block or a technical outage.

I got all this from one of the managers who i basically demanded to speak to. Admittedly he gave me as much info as he could, but they dont have enough to say anything with any real certainty other than "yes its a problem and its not with ProBoards"

I did ask that they better circulate information regarding the issue so when our users call they are already aware of the issue and dont give misinformation, as to whether that happened or not? Who knows

[daisyprincess]

I am sure whoever tells us anything at SKY is saying it as they know it.

I did not mishear what I was told, unfortunately with SKY they have numerous call centres and it is pot luck on who you get on the end of the phone.

The call I put through yesterday appeared to go to someone that was more knowledgeable than most I had spoken too and was prepared to say it was more than a technical hitch.

The facts are the UK Government is bringing in new laws to crack down on file sharing sites and the indication was that SKY had allegedly blocked the PB's portal to these sites.

My complaint has been passed to Level 2 to try and rectify the problem so I can get access again, but I was informed it was not a quick fix or easy to do and indeed may never be done.

My question is, apart from changing Providers, who will ultimately be asked to follow the law too, can PB's move forums that should not be denied access to another server?

[rob1453]

Mar 21, 2010 19:15:41 GMT -8 Dave L said:

Those of you who say you are not on Sky, I think you need to say who you are on, if you want to help.

I analysed all the visitors to my forum yesterday and checked all the IP addresses. All the major ISPs seemed to be there, but none in the IP range allocated to Easynet/Sky.

I looked up the penetration stats for UK broadband suppliers, Sky/Easynet had 14% last year so they are far from having a monopoly on that so they are vulnerable to competition and will want to sort out this mess before the word spreads too far and wide.

This is definitely affecting non-Sky users. I have all the same symptoms, starting at the same time as everyone else, but I don't use Sky for anything. My provider is ukonline. Like everyone else I can't access boards via the standard URLs, though using the :8080 alternative works perfectly.

[OLLEZE]

HI ..... ....AS A DIMWIT....I DONT KNOW WHERE TO PUT THE :8080........DO I PUT IT AFTER MY LOCAL PB SITE ADDRESS IN MY BROWSER.......I HAD A SHORT CUT TO MY MESSAGE BOARDS...BUT GET NOTHING...... ......THANKS FOR ANY HELP

[SpiderMike™]

u put it right after .com

so for me its atp-forums.proboards.com:8080

[bazza1972]

Mar 21, 2010 19:15:41 GMT -8 Dave L said:

Those of you who say you are not on Sky, I think you need to say who you are on.

I have Dave, the Member in this case is on tiscali, I'm aware of the issue with Sky users and the :8080 but it doesn't work for him.

Anyone have any ideas

Thanks again.

[MarkC1984]

I emailed SKY again and was told that they are aware of a problem where some sites have been flagged as a porn site and so are blocking access. Why this would affect ProBoards I don't know as I have never seen any porn on any PB site.

They did tell me (reluctantly as I threatened to leave) that they know there is a problem, it is SKY's problem and they have people working on it round the clock. They have no defifnite timeframe as to when it would be fixed; but they do hope it will be fixed before the end of March 2010. This is what I've been told by SKY, and I can believe that RS, Imagebam and other file hosting sites would be flagged as having porn content but PB Forums?