All's quiet on the eastern front - A VPN in China for Winter 2011

Earlier this year there was quite an upset with various VPN services in China.  Just after Egypt experienced some political unrest, China reacted quickly, and effectively by blocking many anonymous surfing tools, including many VPN services.  PPTP and L2TP VPNs were almost completely blocked throughout the country, and many larger VPN services had their main domain blocked.  It was looking like users would not be able to use a VPN in China to unblock sites and avoid government censorship anymore.

A few weeks later however, many companies had recovered with their original domain in tact, and some with alternate domains available. The blocking of PPTP and L2TP continued into early summer, but restrictions slowly eased off, and many VPN services figured out how to get users connected to PPTP, L2TP, and IPSec VPN protocols.  The importance here is that mobile phone users (iPhone, Android) were again able to connect to VPNs and unblock sites. After all, checking your Facebook account goes hand in hand your iPhone.

So for users looking for a VPN in China, as of winter 2011, there are quite a few options available.  Many new services have begun advertising and operating in China, and older services are now offering custom VPN services for users in China.  For mobile phone users, there are custom versions of PPTP, L2TP, and IPSec that allow you unblock sites on your phones.  However, it should be noted that earlier this year that PPTP and L2TP VPN protocols were completely blocked, so by choosing one of these VPNs, you're still running the risk that you may experience some connectivity problems in the future.

For laptop and desktop users, you've of course got OpenVPN as an option.  OpenVPN uses SSL encryption which is pretty tough, and so far, has not experienced any issues in China.  SSTP is also available.  Though only compatible with Vista and Win 7 operating systems, its also a legitimate VPN for users in China.  As the number of Win 7 users begins to outnumber XP, I think that more services will begin to offer SSTP VPN.  For now, only a few select services offer it.  As a kind of "cure all", OpenVPN can be used on Mac, Linux, and all Windows OS.