My uni blocks access to IRC. I'm looking for convincing arguments to make them unblock it! reddit / irc ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 07:52 I need to convince my university's netadmin to unblock access to IRC. I need some help coming up with arguments that are in favor of IRC apart from IRC being the place where I can get help from open-source communities. **EDIT**: Thanks to /u/burkean who created a shell for me in his vps! That's very kind! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ShinyVolt · 2014-07-22 08:06 How do they block it? There are clients that use HTTPS which i've found to bypass the filter at my school effectively (They just blocked ports + popular webchat sites ) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Pteraspidomorphi · 2014-07-22 08:06 What are the arguments against? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 08:56 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 08:56 Would it be easier if you got a shell account and SSH'd to a remote machine for irc? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 08:58 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 08:59 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 09:00 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 09:02 Tokyoshells are free and good.. http://tokyo.techfilmer.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- unixbeard · 2014-07-22 09:03 From http://freenode.net/irc_servers.shtml - "All freenode servers listen on ports 6665, 6666, 6667, 6697 (SSL only), 7000 (SSL only), 7070 (SSL only), 8000, 8001 and 8002." - Have you tried these alternative ports? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 09:51 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- farded · 2014-07-22 10:52 They're denying you access to part of the Internet for no reason. You may need to ask him his reasoning so you can counter whatever crazy reason he has instead of stabbing in the dark. You could try telling him you need it for the free tech support. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 11:05 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 11:06 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 11:53 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-07-22 12:12 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- macjunkie · 2014-07-22 13:23 Good luck.... A lot of netadmins block IRC since a lot of malware uses IRC so a lot of security best practices dictate that IRC is blocked. We block IRC on our network. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- flotwig · 2014-07-22 14:27 A lot of networks provide access to IRC on the standard HTTP ports as well, which are never blocked. wa.snoonet.org:80 (443 for SSL) to connect to Snoonet. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- GTB3NW · 2014-07-22 21:01 IRC is often/was often used for botnet C&C, it's not uncommon to block it. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- DEADB33F · 2014-07-22 21:33 Why would malware authors use default IRC ports? Or do you do deep packet inspection to identify and block IRC packets on non-standard ports? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- m1ss1ontomars2k4 · 2014-07-23 01:09 Where I used to work they didn't used to block it. But they had to eventually because malware would use public IRC networks to communicate with other infected machines/servers/etc.