Bypassing firewalls and blocked ports in a dorm..

[imhungry]

I'm currently living in student housing. I can connect wirelessly to the school network or plug into the wall.

I'm pretty sure a connection to the ethernet plug in the wall bypasses the firewall, but I'm not sure. People have told me to use a proxy to access certain ports that are blocked, but proxies don't seem to work either...

Can anyone shed some light? My last resort would probably be to setup a router in the room, but that seems unnecessary.

 

[kevnich2]

Your definitely asking the wrong crowd here - nobody will help you try and bypass a school's security practices (since most here are the ones who put these practices in place). All I can say is if you want something or want access to something, contact your school's IT department and ask but trying to circumvent them is a very bad idea

 

[Cogman]

Wait, what are you trying to do? If you are just trying to game locally with some friends, then a router would be your best bet. If it is for something else, you are most likely SOL.

 

[her209]

Move out?

 

[theevilsharpie]

To get around outbound content restrictions, you'll need to use a VPN that terminates to a host outside of the dorm's network. Using a VPN for the express purpose of accessing restricted content is likely against your school's TOS. Since I assume that this is what the VPN will be used for, an SSL VPN is the most likely type of VPN to evade outbound filters and the least likely to raise suspicion among the dorm's IT staff.

To get around inbound content restrictions, you'll either need to host your services on a host outside of the dorm's network, or you'll need to use a broker service (e.g. Steam's matchmaking service).

Your school may also employ traffic shaping to discourage consumption of some forms of content, which you can potentially evade using a VPN at the cost of additional latency.

 

[imagoon]

When your traffic pattern changes and the monitors alert the IT staff that your pattern has turned to 98% SSL, They will cut off your port (at the switch) and also most likely block the IP / Block. That connection is not yours. "Going around the security" will get you booted. If you want a free access connection, go buy your own.

 

[deimos3428]

Whatever it is you're trying to do, consult your school's IT staff first. See, IT admins are actually pretty nice guys, and many of them used to be college students just like you. If they say you can't do it, don't. But it doesn't hurt to ask.

 

[imhungry]

Yep...I'm not trying to do anything sketchy or illegal. I simply need to access the ports used for cPanel and FTP so I can access my web host.

I heard that a proxy would allow me to do this so I was just asking for advice..

 

[JackMDS]

By passing some else's Network (School in this case) configuration when it is blocked is by itself "sketchy or illegal" regardless of the purpose.


.

 

[Fallen Kell]

Your webhost doesn't use sftp? Man talk about lax security... anyone in line between your connection can see your user/password in plain text.

 

[RadiclDreamer]

Yep...I'm not trying to do anything sketchy or illegal. I simply need to access the ports used for cPanel and FTP so I can access my web host.

I heard that a proxy would allow me to do this so I was just asking for advice..

If this is in fact all you are using it for, then typically asking the IT/IS dept will be enough to get them to allow you access unless they are strict/lazy/understaffed

You could proxy, or see if you can get the service set up on another port.

 

[imhungry]

Sounds good, I'll give them a call in the morning. Thanks guys

 

[n0cmonkey]

If all else fails: 3g.