The European Union is finalizing legislation that will force streaming services like Netflix to let users access their account from any country within the organization.
That means someone from Germany could access their Netflix or Amazon account while on vacation in Malta without needing a virtual private network (VPN). Previously, one account would be locked to a single country, and a proxy server would be needed to “trick” these streaming services into thinking you were using an IP address from a different country.
But even that wasn’t a straightforward process. Some companies including Netflix banned the use of VPNs, and restricted customers to content in order to protect licensing agreements with producers.
The new legislation is set to go into effect in early 2018, and will allow users to log in to their personal accounts from any EU country, and gain access to their personalized content.
Unfortunately, American customers won’t see any benefits from the new law, so you’ll have to VPN on over for services that allow it.
The new rules only apply to online, fee-based services. All free content is exempt.
