I lived in China for 4 years, and used a VPN for google, facebook, youtube, etc. All those are blocked by the Great Firewall. But I’ve seen people mentioning VPNs here and there on /Korea and /livinginkorea posts and comments.
What apps need a VPN in Korea? Is it necessary I get one before arriving? I’m coming to Seoul next week on a long term visa.
The ministry of justice blocks some pornographic websites, other then that I cannot think of anything that would require a VPN unless you need to spoof your location for a website but you typically won’t need a VPN for that these days.
Porn, Hulu and to watch borat 2 on Amazon prime.
Porn! But also, I use a VPN in Korea because some services and websites back home will block IP addresses that are not local. For example, a number of Canadian government websites will not function if your IP is outside of Canada, I think one of my banks do too.
Korea asks for age verification for a lot of websites, including youtube videos. This requires a verification process that is cumbersome and sometimes doesn’t work for foreigners.
More than anything, it is just an annoyance. I never had a VPN until this year, but that is mostly because Im becoming increasingly worried about privacy issues.
Lol I needed a vpn to register as an overseas US voter on my county’s website. I get the idea behind blocking foreign IP addresses but it like defeats the purpose of providing services for overseas voters.
Nope, I had one for a while but canceled it just because really didn’t use it. Only thing I really used it for was for looking at different countries YouTube/Netflix. Like another user said, it’s useful for age blocked content which you run into quite frequently, but if you’re arriving on a long term visa you will get the information (verified cell phone, an ARC card) which will allow you to verify your age effectively stopping the blocked content.
Thanks all for sharing your input and experience. I paused my VPN subscription when I left China, so I may unpause it once I get to Korea. I’ll be netflixing a lot during my quarantine! Seems like it may be good to have, just in case, for some shopping and banking sites.
I use a VPN due to the work I do. Other than that, I only use it to watch content that is blocked by copyright due to location. You can also browse some sites faster with a VPN.
I use a VPN to watch TV from the states. The only other thing I use it for is shopping from certain websites from the states. Otherwise I don’t need it.
Sometimes youtube videos are blocked cause you have to prove you are over 18 to watch. So I just turn on my vpn. Basically anything that is too violent.
Sometimes. But 95% of the time I don’t use a vpn at all.
I need a VPN to access various banking or shopping websites. Target and Kohl’s for example as shopping sites that I have trouble with unless I’m running a VPN.
Netflix it’s nice to have it for, because different countries show different movies. In the past 2 years we have watched various things on Korean, US, Canadian, and UK Netflix at least. I wouldn’t necessarily get the VPN for Netflix, but since I need it for banking and it’s cheap (~$3/month if you prepay long term), why not.
I use a free one to access Netflix in my home country from time to time. Some YouTube videos are rated 19+ (literally I was watching one and there was a kissing scene and to my North American eyes it was mild but I had to prove age via a text message).
Otherwise unless you like to indulge in private time with 19+ movies you should be fine without it
I use it for HBOMax. Definitely worth it in my opinion.
A lot of people are saying porn, and yeah, but I use a VPN for a lot of things like switching subtitles on Netflix if a show doesn’t have English subtitles on Korean Netflix. That happens a lot actually. Some friends and I were trying to watch a movie a few days ago but realized there weren’t any English subtitles, so I just turned on the VPN and refreshed the page so we could watch it.
I also use it for bypassing age limit stuff that can be random and annoying, or for downloading movies from Amazon. If you’re at all paranoid about security, it’s a good thing to have. I use Express VPN.
For public wifi, it is good to use vpn for personal privacy. I use purevpn now. Expressvpn was too expensive. PIA was damn slow.
I use a VPN for Disney+ and to watch things on the US and UK Netflix catalagoues.
No you’re good. Might want to get something so you can watch Netflix from other countries as some of the stuff isn’t carried here.
I use a VPN like maybe 5 times a year when some websites won’t actually work when accessed overseas (like my state’s DMV).
Korean Netflix is totally ok IMO with content these days
And anything else I just torrent