For the past year, internet service provider Slingshot has offered a service to their customers called Global Mode, whereby a visitor to New Zealand could sign into his accounts at Netflix or Hulu or BBC iPlayer while staying in the country. This was seen as a "slight of hand" maneuver that allowed New Zealanders to bypass national restrictions on these types of streaming media services.
But now Slingshot is opening their VPN service for all their customers, not just for those imaginary visitors from California or Kent. Approximately two dozen sites that are normally blocked will now be open for all Slingshot customers in New Zealand.
"No beating around the bush. This is to watch Netflix, this is to watch BBC iPlayer, this is to watch Hulu, this is to watch Amazon Prime," said Slingshot general manager Taryn Hamilton. "This is just enabling people to consume those services if they want to," he said "Kiwis deserve to watch the same stuff that guys in the States do and at the same price."
Those who sign up for certain media streaming sites are still required to provide an address in the countries that are officially allowed to have those services, and providing a false address will break the terms of the agreement. But Slingshot is staying out of that legal quagmire, and states that the contract between the user and the media sites is none of their business.
Slingshot says that with this move, they hope to open up the market for even more legitimate streaming media service in New Zealand.
You can read the story at The New Zealand Herald.
