"Network blocking is never going to be the solution" – Cloudflare slams anti-piracy tactics

Increasingly, countries, especially in Europe, have been enforcing strict measures lately to halt the spread of pirated content. Yet, Cloudflare, a leading DNS server provider, told TechRadar that "network blocking is never going to be the solution. "

DNS providers were the first to be targeted with blocking orders and lawsuits by French, Spanish, and Italian authorities. However, these authorities have now begun targeting some of the best VPN services on similar grounds. Technologists, however, have long warned that these tactics lead to disproportionate overblocking incidents while undermining people's internet freedom.

"Those kinds of network blocking efforts are having collateral effects and are ruining the internet," Vice President and Global Head of Public Policy at Cloudflare, Alissa Starzak, told TechRadar, suggesting we should think of any internet block as censorship.

Why are DNS and VPNs the target of rightsholders?

Short for domain name system, a ...