Paywall (NSFW !!!)

A reader on Tox wonders how I read all the articles in Italian newspapers, even those covered by Paywall, and how much money I spend on reading them. The truth is that the paywalls of Italian newspapers are entirely handcrafted and easily circumvented.

But there is one that reaches levels of craftsmanship that are scary. I want to talk about it because in my opinion it represents very well "the level" of IT skills in some sectors of the Italian economy.

This is the Paywall of "La Stampa".

It is the most catastrophic Paywall in history, never overcome in malfunction since the days when Sasha Gray decided to use fishnet stockings as a contraceptive.

So, let's take for example an article, which in theory would be "covered by Paywall":

Well. Now we want to read more than what we are reading right now.

Then we take the browser and right click. We have to do it in an "empty" point, in the photo above we say the "empty" on the bottom left.

When we have clicked, the browser will present a menu that says "View Source", or the equivalent in your language.

Now let's go to the source and search for "article-body".

Yes, of course, it is annoying to have all those HTML tags, but if you really think that it is not possible to automate the download of the articles, try curl, and you will find that it is not very difficult.

Now, I don't want to comment on how this thing looks to an IT person. Sasha Gray takes care of it. After all, maybe you will answer that the article was much longer: but if that was the preamble, why not have it read everything? (answer: that's the whole article).

I could tell you how to disable the courier's paywall simply by opening an anonymous browser window, which restarts the count of the pages that you can read for free, provided you change the IP (using a VPN or TOR is sufficient), and so on . Apparently it is a system based on IP + Cookies. We are still at Sasha's fishnet level.

It was enough for me to order the router to restart the PPPoE connection every day, in order to have a new IP per day:

And at that point, reset the IP, a normal "incognito" connection of the browser is enough to trigger the count of the articles you can read for free. None of that: at most you are forcing the BNG to work slightly more on the service edge. Don't worry, your telco can do it: the control plane of a BNG does not give a shit from mane to evening, or almost.

That of the republic is slightly more complicated to circumvent, in the sense that while the two of Corriere and La Stampa protect the contents as much as the fishnet socks of Sasha Gray, the Republic reaches slightly higher levels, let's say at the level that I would define "the invulnerable hymen by Gianna Michaels ". It takes, how to say, le physique du rôle (in the computer sense), but then you have everything you want.

So if this is your problem, and you worry about it, I can tell you that:

• No, I don't pay a penny to read the "restricted areas" of the online newspapers I mention.
• No, therefore I am not so obsessed with Italic current affairs as to pay money for "more professional" news. I have already installed on the browser all the tools that are used to bypass the various Paywalls.
• I have no words on implementing those paywalls. Really. Calling them "homemade", "amateur", or worse, is a little. I made comparisons with porn because it was the only thing that seemed adequate.

Maybe this post will attract the ire of the newspapers, but on the other hand, guys, when you use the same paywall that protected the virginity of Sasha Gray and Gianna Michaels, how long did it take before you became the Internet joke?

I mean '…. ssseriously ??

Are you the main editorial group in the country, and all the RBAC you can do is this?

Source: https://keinpfusch.net/paywall/